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INDIANA AN TIETAM MONUMENT 
Dedicated Saturday, September 17, 1910— Forty Eighth Anniversary of Battle 



Indiana at Antietam 



REPORT 

of the 

Indiana . Antietam Monument 
Commission 

and 

Ceremonies at the Dedication 
of the Monument 



In commemoration of the services of her soldiers 
who fell there. 



Together with history of events leading up to the Battle of 

Antietam; the report of General George B. McClellan, 

of the battle; the formation of the Army of the 

Potomac, at the battle; and the histories of 

the five Indiana regiments engaged. 



Indianapolis, Indiana 
1911 






THE AETNA PRESS 
INDIANAPOLIS 




PREFACE. 

In the beautiful National Cemetery at Sharpsburg, Maryland, 
not far from the center of Antietam battlefield, sleep many 
thousands of brave men, who fell there forty-eight years ago. 
Among them are men from each of the Indiana regiments that 
fought there. They will sleep on, unmindful of what a grateful 
commonwealth has done in remembrance of them. 

"They need not now our praise, 
Nor the shaft we raise, 
Nor flower for any lost, forgotten grave," 

but their living comrades, their families, kindred, descendants, 
and all the people of our great State, will not cease to feel thank- 
ful that the General Assembly of 1909, in its wisdom, made pro- 
vision to mark the spot where these men fell. 

The act appropriating a fund for this monument was in line 
with the policy of our State to erect upon each field where Indi- 
ana soldiers, in any considerable number, fought during the Civil 
War, some appropriate memorial, by means of which their ser- 
vices and sacrifices might not be forgotten by coming genera- 
tions, and while this appropriation came late, it came in such 
ample form as to emphasize the wisdom of our lawmakers in 
their determination to do well, rather than hurriedly, what all 
felt should be done at some future day. 

Through this act the heroes of Antietam have received their 
share of the honors a grateful commonwealth would bestow upon 
the men who gave their lives for their country. 

The selection of portraits, forming part of the report, repre- 
sents officers connected with the Indiana regiments that fought 
at Antietam, and all but two of whom were there with their 
regiments, and one of these two, the brave Major May, fell on 
the bloody field of Gainesville, Virginia, August 28, 1862. An- 
other of the same regiment fell leading his regiment in a charge 



at Antietam, and still another of the same regiment fell on the 
first day of the Wilderness campaign. The last colonel of the 
Fourteenth Indiana fell leading his regiment over the enemy's 
ramparts at the Bloody Angle, on the 12th of May, 1864, and 
two others went down on the front line on the first day's fighting 
at Gettysburg. 

All are portraits of men who immortalized themselves on the 
field of conflict, and all but one have long since joined the silent 
majority. It is a sacred company, over which it is fitting the 
chief executive of the State that has honored them, should pre- 
side. 

Their faces, arid the scenes from the battlefield of Antietam, 
will bring to the bosom of each survivor of the awful conflict a 
heart-throb, and inspire in the minds of their descendants and 
coming generations some interest in what the sons of Indiana 
did on this memorable field. 

The appropriation has been ample to enable the commission 
to locate upon this field, a monument that more than favorably 
compares with any memorial hitherto erected by any other State 
whose soldiers fought there, and one of which every citizen of 
our State may feel justly proud. 

The people of Indiana owe thanks to the General Assembly 
of 1909 for this splendid tribute to her fallen heroes, and partic- 
ularly do they owe grateful acknowledgment to the members of 
that assembly who specially championed the act making this ap- 
propriation. 

The Hon. C. C. Schreeder, of Vanderburg county, in the lower 
house, and the Hon. T. R. Brady, Senator from Wabash county, 
in the upper house, have earned the gratitude of all the people of 
Indiana for what they did in making this work possible. 

And the commission would not forget to thank your Excel- 
lency and all the attaches of your office, those of the State Au- 
ditor's office, and of the various other departments, for the cor- 
dial and friendly aid it has received in this responsible task. 

W. N. Pickeeill, 
Compiler and Editor. 




HON. THOMAS R. MARSHALL 
Governor of Indiana 



Report of Commission 



CHAPTER I. 

Indianapolis, Indiana, 1910. 
To the Hon. Thomas R. Marshall, Governor of the State of 

Indiana: 

Sir : The Indiana Antietam Monument Commission of the 
State of Indiana begs leave to submit the following report, of the 
discharge of the duties imposed upon it under the authority of an 
Act of the General Assembly of the State of Indiana, approved 
March 8, 1909, as follows : 

CHAPTER 158. 

AN ACT entitled an act concerning the location, erection and 
dedication of monuments and markers on the battlefield of 
Antietam, and making an appropriation therefor, and declar- 
ing an emergency. 

[H. 167. Approved March 8, 1909.] 

MONUMENTS — ANTIETAM NATIONAL PARK COMMISSION. 

Section 1. Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the 
State of Indiana, That the Governor of said State be and is 
hereby empowered to appoint a commission consisting of five 
citizens of the State of Indiana — one from each Indiana regi- 
ment engaged in the battle of Antietam (Maryland), fought 
September 17, 1862. All of said commission shall have served 
as officers or soldiers, and were present and engaged in the said 
battle of Antietam. They are to locate and mark the historically 
important positions held and occupied by the respective Indiana 
regiments during the battle, to locate proper sites for monuments. 



6 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

and markers, contract for the construction and erection of the 
same in accordance with the plans and under the supervision 
of the Antietam National Park Commission, and to cause the 
same, with necessary attendant expenses, to be paid for in com- 
pliance with the hereinafter provisions of this act. 

OFFICERS OF THE COMMISSION. 

Sec. 2. That the officers of said commission shall be presi- 
dent, secretary and a treasurer, elected by the commission. 
control by the governor. 

Sec. 3. The commission shall at all times be subject to the 
direction and control of the Governor, to whom the commission 
must report as often as required, and who shall have absolute 
power of removal and of appointment so long as the commission 
shall continue in service. 

SERVE WITHOUT PAY. 

Sec. 4. Said commission shall serve without pay, other than 
actual expenses necessary to the discharge of their duties. 

FORM OF CONTRACT. 

Sec. 5. All contracts for designs or for monuments and the 
erection of the same shall be in writing, in duplicate, in the name 
of the State, signed by the contractor and by the president and 
secretary of the commission for the State, and approved by the 
Governor, one copy of which shall be deposited with the Gov- 
ernor. 

PAYMENTS — STATEMENT. 

Sec. 6. Payments shall be made upon contract of the com- 
mission, and for their necessary expenses, upon statement in 
writing, approved by the Governor, and which shall be deposited 
with the Auditor of State, who shall draw his warrant upon the 
Treasury of the State for the amount of the same, in favor of 
the person entitled thereto, which shall be paid by the State 
Treasurer out of the funds hereinafter appropriated for that 
purpose, and payments shall not be made except upon such state- 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 7 

ment, which must be signed by the president, or some one desig- 
nated by him. 

APPROPRIATION. 

Sec. 7. That there is hereby appropriated, out of any fund 
in the State Treasury to the credit of the general revenue fund 
not otherwise appropriated, for the purpose of this act, the sum 
of fifteen thousand ($15,000) dollars, to be expended as follows, 
to wit : In the erection of monuments and markers for four 
regiments of infantry, one section of artillery, and one regiment 
of cavalry, the sum of ten thousand ($10,000) dollars, or so 
much thereof as may be necessary, and for the purchase of lands 
on which to locate said monuments and markers, and for ex- 
penses of locating, erecting and dedicating said monuments and 
markers, and for the actual expenses of the commission necessary 
to the discharge of their duty, and for the compilation and pub- 
lication of their report, together with proper illustrations, history 
of the battle of Antietam, and the Indiana regiments that par- 
ticipated therein, the sum of five thousand ($5,000) dollars, or 
so much thereof as may be necessary. 

EMERGENCY. 

Sec. 8. Whereas, an emergency exists for the immediate tak- 
ing effect of this act, therefore it shall be enforced from and 
after its passage. 

Under the provisions of this act the following gentlemen 
were commissioned by the Governor of the State of Indiana, on 
the 8th day of May, 1909, as the Indiana Antietam Monument 
Commission, the same consisting of one representative from each 
of the five regiments from Indiana, engaged in the battle of 
Antietam, on the 17th of September, 1862, to-wit: 

James M. Brown. Seventh Indiana Infantry. 

David E. Beem, Fourteenth Indiana Infantry. 

Nelson Pegg, Nineteenth Indiana Infantry. 

William W. Daugherty, Twenty-seventh Indiana Infantry. 

William N. Pickerill, Third Indiana Cavalry. 



8 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

This commission organized on the 24th day of May, 1909, by 
electing William W. Daugherty, of the Twenty-seventh Regi- 
ment, as President; David E. Beem, of the Fourteenth Regiment, 
as Treasurer, and William N. Pickerill, of the Third Cavalry, 
as its Secretary. 

By direction of the Secretary of War, government engineers 
surveyed the battlefield of Antietam, as early as 1867, and later, 
by authority of Congress, the Antietam National Park Board 
was organized, to act under the direction of the Secretary of War. 

As this commission, in carrying out the provisions of the act 
creating it, was required, also, to act under the supervision of 
the Antietam National Park Board, its first step, after organiz- 
ing, was to visit, in a body, the battlefield of Antietam, at Sharps- 
burg, Maryland, on the 13th of June, 1909, where, attended by a 
member of the board and the superintendent of the battlefield, 
the commission went over the field, and particularly those por- 
tions of it where their respective regiments were in line of 
battle and performed service on the 17th of September, 1862, 
when the battle was fought. 

This enabled the commission to ascertain what other states 
had accomplished, in memory of their dead, who had died on this 
field, and what we might do, within the limits of our appropria- 
tion, for the State of Indiana and in conformity with the regula- 
tions of the Antietam National Park Board, by which we were 
to be governed. 

The land upon which the battle of Antietam was fought is 
principally owned by private individuals, just as it was at the 
time of the battle, and in that respect differs from the battlefields 
of Shiloh, Gettysburg, Chicamauga and Vicksburg, where the 
title to the lands upon which those battles were fought has been 
acquired by the government. 

With the exception of a site on the east side of the town of 
Sharpsburg, and south of the Boonsboro and Sharpsburg turn- 
pike, bought for a National Cemetery and cared for by an ap- 
pointee of the War Department, and several strips of land where 




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INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 9 

the battle was especially severe and upon which the government 
has located named roads and avenues, and rights obtained by pur- 
chase from the commissioners of Washington county, Maryland, 
in established State and county roads, all the lands on the Antie- 
tam battlefield have continued in private ownership and farmed 
by such owners, and where locations have been desired for the 
erection of monuments or other structures it has been necessary 
to acquire the title to the same from these private owners at the 
price demanded by them. 

Notwithstanding this drawback some very creditable monu- 
ments have been erected on the Antietam battlefield by the States 
of New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Con- 
necticut and Ohio in quite desirable locations. 

Under the provisions of Section 7 of the act creating this 
commission the appropriation for the erection of monuments and 
markers for Indiana regiments participating in the battle of 
Antietam was $10,000, and this fund we might have employed in 
the erection of a small monument for each one of the five regi- 
ments engaged, but, on looking over the field and seeing what 
other States had done, the commission decided that it would be 
more creditable to the State of Indiana to use the fund at our 
disposal in erecting one monument, at some central point on the 
field, and place a marker for each regiment where it was in line 
of battle on the 17th of September, 1862. 

Following out this idea, the next step was to secure a desir- 
able location for the erection of the Indiana monument, and this 
was found at the northeast intersection of the Hagerstown and 
Sharpsburg turnpike and Cornfield avenue, a thoroughfare es- 
tablished by the U. S. government and about one mile and a 
quarter north of the town of Sharpsburg in the near vicinity of 
the center of the battlefield of Antietam, and near which point 
the States of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Massachusetts have 
already erected handsome monuments. 

Here a tract of land one hundred feet square was purchased 
from private owners of the same and the deed executed to the 



10 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

United States for the reason that the title was required to be so 
placed in order that the monument when once erected should re- 
ceive the care and supervision of the War Department through 
its superintendent of the Antietam battlefield. 

The sites for the markers for the five regiments from Indiana 
engaged in the battle were also selected at points in roads and 
avenues controlled by the government of the United States, at or 
near points where the respective regiments were in line when the 
battle ended, or where they performed their principal fighting 
during the battle, the inscription on bronze tablets capping the 
markers to indicate the exact location of the several regiments, 
their brigades, division and corps being noted on their respective 
tablets. 

The commission having secured locations for the monument 
and markers, its next step was to secure a design that would em- 
body its ideas of what was desired, and this task was submitted 
to Mr. John R. Lowe, an architect of Indianapolis, who at an 
early day after he had undertaken the work, furnished us a 
design that was entirely acceptable to the commission, and it was 
promptly accepted. 

As will be noted in the engraving which forms a part of this 
report, the monument has a handsomely ornamented base twenty- 
two feet square and fifteen feet high, surmounted by a shaft 
thirty-five feet high, four sided and tapering from three feet six 
inches to two feet six inches, the entire structure and super- 
structure being light Barre granite. The monument is fifty feet 
high and stands on a solid concrete base six feet deep. 

On the north front elevation are the raised letters forming 
the word "Indiana," and on this same front is a bronze tablet, 
three feet by three feet eight inches, upon which is inscribed the 
names of the five regiments participating in the battle of An- 
tietam, and above this tablet is the bronze seal bearing the coat 
of arms of Indiana. 

The markers are of the same material, each three and one- 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 11 

half feet by two and one-half feet, placed on a concrete base 
four feet deep and the full dimensions of the marker. 

This design, with plans and specifications, furnished by our 
architect, were submitted to the War Department for its approval, 
and the same having been obtained, public notice was given in- 
viting bids for the construction and erection of the monument and 
markers. 

Pursuant to this notice, after spirited bidding, on the 5th of 
October, 1909, at the State House at Indianapolis, the contract 
for the construction and erection of the monument and markers 
was let to the J. N. Forbes Granite Company, of Chambersburg, 
Pa., which contract was reduced to writing, signed as required 
by the act creating the commission, and the same, with the bond 
required of the contractor, was approved by your Excellency. 

The commission having reached the conclusion that a neat 
stone curb would add much to the appearance of the plat of 
ground upon which the monument was to be located, and the ap- 
propriation being found sufficient for the purpose, entered into 
a contract with the same firm that had its contract for erecting 
the monument and markers for the construction of the curbing. 

This curbing is of Woodbury granite and surrounds the entire 
plat of one hundred feet square, being in sections of fourteen 
feet four inches each, two feet two inches by ten inches, the joints 
and corners each being supported by concrete piers five feet long, 
three feet wide and four feet deep. 

The commission regarded the construction of the concrete 
foundations designed to support the monument, curbing and 
markers as a matter of special importance and a part of the work 
we could know little about after these structures were once com- 
pleted, and accordingly one of our number, Mr. J. M. Brown, a 
builder and contractor, was selected to go to the Antietam battle- 
field and remain there and oversee the work while our contractors 
were engaged in placing the foundations. Mr. Brown accepted 
this mission, went to the battlefield and remained while this part 
of the work was being performed, and on his return reported to 



12 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

the commission that the work of placing the foundations had 
been satisfactorily performed. 

In July, 1910, the contractors for the construction of the 
monument and other work having notified the commission of the 
completion of the same on the 8th of August. 1910. the commis- 
sion proceeded in a body to the battlefield of Antietam, at Sharps- 
burg, Maryland, where it made a careful inspection of all the 
work performed by the contractors for the same, and decided 
that all the work to be performed by them, including the monu- 
ment, markers and curbing, was in full compliance with their 
contract in every particular, and the commission had no hesita- 
tion in accepting the same, and they take pleasure in commending 
the J. N. Forbes Granite Company, of Chambersburg, Pa., to all 
those desiring similar work, both for their faithful compliance 
with their undertakings as well as being a most agreeable firm 
to deal with in their line. 

After accepting the work from the contractors the commission 
at once took up the matter of the dedication of the monument, 
pursuant to the usual custom in such matters, and while still on 
the battlefield of Antietam it was decided to fix Saturday, the 
17th day of September, 1910, the forty-eighth anniversary of the 
battle, as an appropriate date for the dedication of the monument, 
and arrangements were at once entered upon to carry out that 
purpose. 

The best possible arrangement obtainable, under adverse con- 
ditions, was entered into by the commission with the railroads 
for conveying the people of Indiana and others desiring to attend 
the dedication of this monument was entered into, and the neces- 
sary publicity given of the fact that all desiring to attend the 
dedication might avail themselves of the opportunity. 

The dedication of the monument as planned took place in the 
near vicinity of the same on the 17th of September, 1910, in 
which the following program was carried out : 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 13 



CHAPTER II. 



Indiana Day. 

Antietam, Maryland, Saturday, September 17, 1910. 

ORDER OF EXERCISES. 
Dedication of the joint monument of the 

Seventh Indiana Volunteer Infantry 
Fourteenth Indiana Volunteer Infantry 
Nineteenth Indiana Volunteer Infantry 
Twenty-seventh Indiana Volunteer Infantry 
Third Indiana Volunteer Cavalry 

Music — The American Overture Boonesboro Band 

Prayer Rev. Mathias L. Haines, D. D. 

Pastor First Presbyterian Church, Indianapolis, Ind. 

Music — "Star Spangled Banner." 

Poem Meredith Nicholson 

Transfer of Monument to the Governor of Indiana 

Major William W. Daugherty 

President Indiana Antietam Monument Commission. 

Acceptance of the Same and Transfer to the Government 

of the United States 

Hon. Thomas R. Marshall, Governor of Indiana 

Receipt on Behalf of the President of the United States 

Brigadier General George B. Davis 

Judge-Advocate General United States Army. 

Music — Grand Selection of War Songs. 

The overture prescribed in the program was followed by an 
invocation by the Rev. Mathias L. Haines, D. D., pastor of the 
First Presbyterian Church of Indianapolis. 



14 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

THE INVOCATION. 

All mighty and all gracious God, unto Thee, this anniversary 
day, we lift our hearts in reverence and in gratitude. 

We adore Thee, the Father of mercies, the giver of every 
good gift by which our lives are enriched and our hearts made 
glad. 

O Thou sovereign ruler of nations, we recognize Thy good- 
ness and overruling providence in all the years of our history 
as a nation. Thou hast done great things for us whereof we are 
glad. Our fathers looked unto Thee and were lightened. Thou 
didst enable them to lay deep and strong the foundations of our 
republic. 

With thankfulness we remember how, in the years that have 
followed, Thou hast guarded us as a people from dangers seen 
and unseen, and guided us along the path of ever increasing 
and wonderous prosperity. 

Especially this day do we recognize Thy divine help and 
guidance through the sad and painful experience of our Civil 
War. In mercy Thou didst rule and overrule, bringing good out 
of evil, and preserve for us the priceless heritage of an undivided 
nation. 

We invoke Thy presence and Thy blessing upon us as now in 
behalf of our commonwealth we engage in this service of grati- 
tude and honor to the memory of those who here struggled and 
suffered and died for their country. May the monument this day 
unveiled be a memorial to the generations to come, witnessing to 
the lasting gratitude and honor in which they are held who here 
counted not their lives dear unto themselves for the preservation 
of the Union. May the patriotism which inspired them to such 
heroism and sacrifices be enshrined in our hearts and inspire us 
to a nobler love of country and a greater devotion to the sacred 
interests committed to our trust. 

Remember, we pray Thee, all the survivors of the host that 
here battled for the nation. Wherever thev rnav be this day, 
gathered here on this hallowed ground or in places far scattered, 





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INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 15 

help them to recognize Thy divine goodness in sparing their 
lives and in giving them to see the prosperity and peace of our 
land. May the realization that they were permitted to be in some 
measure instruments in Thy hand for securing these high bless- 
ings, be an abiding satisfaction and joy. 

We pray for the survivors of those armies that here on 
either side and on other fields of battle contended with each other 
throughout our Civil War. Regard in tender mercy all the vet- 
erans of that conflict, the blue and the gray. As now under one 
flag they have come to see eye to eye and join hand to hand in a 
united citizenship and comradeship, smooth the path before them. 
May that path grow brighter and brighter with heavenly light 
through faith in the one all sufficient Redeemer. 

O, Thou God of comfort, graciously remember the widows 
and orphans of those who here gave their lives a sacrifice. Re- 
member the bereaved households of all the soldiers who in the 
years since have been called from these earthly scenes. Sustain 
and comfort them in their sorrow, and through Thy Fatherly 
care may their temporal and spiritual needs be provided for. 

Bless, O God, our beloved country. Endue with wisdom 
from above and grace the President of these United States, the 
Governor of our own State and all in places of authority. Cause 
Thy righteousness to reign more and more in the hearts and lives 
of our people. Make us an increasing power for good among the 
nations, and through us, we beseech Thee, hasten the coming of 
the Kingdom of Heaven on earth in all its blessed fullness and 
glory. 

These blessings we ask in the one name of Thy Son, our 
divine Lord, the great Captain of our salvation, who hath shown 
us the worth and consecrated forever the power of sacrifice in 
His own blessed life and death for our salvation. 

Unto Him and unto Thee, Our Father, and unto the Holy 
Spirit, or comforter, do we give the praise and the love, both 
now and forever more, Amen. 



16 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Following the invocation, the following poem, pertinent to 
the occasion, was read by Mr. Meredith Nicholson, of Indian- 
apolis. 

ON THE ANTIETAM BATTLEFIELD. 

(Poem read today by Meredith Nicholson at the dedication of 
the Indiana Antietam Monument.) 

I. 

How shall we climb, 
On what bright stair of rhyme, 
To that pure mood 
Whence man, 
Forgetting strifes and scars 
Celestial plains may scan, 
And counsel take of that high brotherhood 
Bivouacked in God's Republic of the Stars? 
We come in peace ; it is a peace they gave ; 
They need not now our praise 
Nor the shaft we raise. 
Nor flower for any lost, forgotten grave. 
Our debt is still unpaid 
When the last wreath is laid. 
Rear the shaft and bless the stone 
In fitting accolade : 
Our debt we still must own. 

II. 

It is their right to challenge from the ramparts of the 

Lord, 
Demanding, "Keep ye faith with us who strove there 

in the sun, 
Nor faltered in the crossing of the bullet-rippled ford ; 
But set our faces to the flame until the day was won. 
"How keep ye faith who speak our praise, O answer 

us today ! 
We charged the bridge, we held the ridge, we perished 

in the corn, 
But held the fire-swept line against our brothers of the 

gray, 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 17 

Nor answered that September eve the bugle's cry for- 
lorn ! 

"Not for ourselves we met the storm there, where in 
peace ye stand ; 

We kept the faith, we held the field by warm blood 
consecrate ; 

'Twas ours to wait, to charge, to die by mandate from 
your hand ; 

What have ye done for us who fought and held as 
one the state?" 

III. 

How shall we serve them best. 

Who, that September dawn 

Lifted the banner of the west 

And bore it on the battle's crest 

And dared Oblivion? 

Not in gold mintage of their own endeavor. 

Nor with gun and sword or thundering cannonade, 

Nor in lines like theirs, iron-fronted, pausing never 

Till the foeman's march was stayed! 

Ours be the task to guard in peace the light 

That led them through the fight, 

With deep-ranked phalanx in firm lines arrayed, 

And Conscience, like a picket, posted well, 

For Treason doth not wait 

To win in war the unwatched gate. 

But, cowering past the drowsy sentinel, 

Strikes in the dark with venomous hate. 

And flaunts false banners from the citadel. 

IV. 

We serve them best 

By serving well in peace the deathless cause 

For which they strove with bayonet at breast ; 

The voice that summoned them of old 

Trumpets again for volunteers ! 

Let it of us be told 

That we stand as they with back to wall 

Risking our all for All, 

Unawed, unshaken, undismayed by fears, 



18 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Battling for Justice, Mercy, Righteous Laws, 

Wherewith to pillar this high-arching span 

That rose o'er dead men through ten thousand years, 

Framing a temple meet to be 

Home for the ark where Liberty 

Brooding in secrecy. 

Obedient to God's plan, 

Inviolate guards the faith of man in man. 



O faith that God hath wrought, 
O faith that man hath sought, 
O faith whereby was sacrificed 
To Roman spears the victor, Christ, 
Kindle anew in us thy holy flame ! 
'Twas Washington's high creed and Jefferson's ; 
Its seed were planted deep in Franklin's heart: 
'Twas Whittier's song; 'tis all of Phillip's fame. 
Of Grant's blunt strength it was the nobler part. 
It edged our sword for war and blessed the guns, 
And set immovably against the sky 
The star-filled lines of Lincoln's majesty. 

VI. 

Mighty and wise were they 

Of our natal day, 

Who charted well the untried sea, 

And planned the course in calm serenity, 

That we the ordained path might keep 

Nor vainly hope false, traitorous shoals to clear : 

Better with reefed sail and the laboring oar 

By the high stars to steer, 

Through clean, free tides of waters broad and deep, 

With the old compass near, 

Than perish in dark seas unknown of any shore. 

VII. 

Thy secret, O Democracy, 
May not be hoarded like man's gold, 
Or like some plot of earth 
Tended a while and sold 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 19 

Like any bauble recked of little worth : 

'Twas given to man in perpetuity, 

An ichor with age wise and with youth strong, 

Kindling the heart of man like deathless song. 

'Tis Liberty alone 

Speaks a universal tongue, 

That was old when the stars were young, 

And utters it in many an accent clear 

And sings it so all men may hear, 

And carves it deep in stone. 

Freedom, by Wisdom taught, 

Alertly walks the heights, unawed, nor knowing Hate 

nor Fear ; 
He hath her meaning caught 
Who not in Rage destroys 
Nor gives to wrack and rime, 
But lifts a myriad fallen Troys 
In deeds that outlast Time. 

VIII. 

O not for us to doubt 

Or doubting to despair, 

But rather on with lusty shout 

The insolent foe to dare, 

Wise schemes fare ill and leaders pass 

To be as nothing 'neath the grass, 

But the faith of man in man abides ! 

It is thy soul, Democracy ! 

The nation's heart where God's love hides, 

The pulse of all things free. 

And we serve them best who stood 

Here by Antietam's flood, 

Who fell in the corn and died in the wood — 

We serve them best, our men of the west, 

By struggling still on the fire-swept slope. 

On shattered meadow and hill's hot crest, 

The gage forever man's ultimate hope : 

The right to labor's hard-won fee. 

The right to stand with unbent knee. 



20 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

With none denied his liberty, 
And none denying his comrade's call, 
But brothers bound in felicity 
And the love of God o'er all. 

Major William W. Daugherty, president of the Indiana An- 
tietam Monument Commission, then transferred the Monument 
to the Governor of the State of Indiana, in the following address : 

"Indiana has always been proud to honor her citizen soldiers. 
From the first gun fired at Sumpter she looked with interest to 
these who were in the field. Her great war Governor was the 
first to hear the call which indicated that assistance was needed 
to care for the wounded or sick soldiers from the State. The dead 
would hardly be buried after a great battle before the agents of 
Governor Morton were in the midst of the wounded, the sick or 
the dying. From the first battle in West Virginia to the last at 
Palmetto ranch in Texas, Indiana troops were engaged, and from 
the first they all knew that Governor Morton was looking to their 
care and welfare. 

"From time to time Indiana has seen fit to appropriate money 
to commemorate the services of her sons. At Indianapolis stands 
that splendid monument. At Shiloh, Vicksburg, Chicamauga and 
Gettysburg she has raised splendid shafts of stone, marble and 
bronze to show to future generations that the services of her sons 
are appreciated by those of the present day. 

"It is through the generosity of our beloved State that we are 
here pday. The Legislature at its session of 1909, appropriated 
moiey to erect this monument. Our worthy Governor saw fit to 
appoint in accordance with the act, a representative from each of 
the regiments that took part in this battle. It would not be proper 
for me, at this time, to enter into a general description of the 
battle. You who have survived that period, and those who have 
read of those times will recall the general gloom that was over 
the whole country. 

AFFAIRS HAD NOT GONE) WELL. 

"The affairs in the West had not gone well. Along the Atlan- 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 21 

tic coast no great victory was had to cheer the people of the 
North. The Army of the Potomac had suffered a series of dis- 
asters before Richmond, under General McClellan. General 
Pope had been defeated and driven back to Washington. There 
General McClellan, with his own army and that of General Pope, 
organized a new Army of the Potomac and pushed at once to 
meet General Lee, now in Maryland. A series of skirmishes was 
the order of the day, amounting at times almost to battles, until 
on September 14 came the first real clash. At South Mountain 
and Crampton Pass the rebel army was encountered and driven 
from the field. Pursuit was taken up, and on the 17th of Sep- 
tember, 1862, forty-eight years ago today, on this ground was 
fought the bloodiest battle of a century. 

"Within one mile square of this part of the battlefield more 
men were killed and wounded than on any battlefield for a hun- 
dred years. The men composing this part of the army and that 
took part in the battle, were the First, Second and Twelfth Army 
Corps, and according to General McClellan, amounted to 43,795 
men, but the corps commanders do not make the number as 
great. A very able historian says the federal troops which really 
fought the battle of Antietam were the First, Second, Ninth and 
Twelfth Corps. The Ninth Corps being on the extreme left does 
not enter into any statement of losses on this part of the battle- 
field. 

LOSS OF OVER TWENTY PER CENT. 

"The loss in the three army corps mentioned as having fought 
on this part of the line as given by General McClellan amounted 
to over nine thousand and the number of these who were taken 
prisoners were a little over seven hundred. It will be seen that 
the loss was over twenty per cent. The Fifth and Sixth Corps 
and cavalry, which operated on this part of the line, sustained a 
loss of only 596, while they numbered 29,550, being only two per 
cent., so it can be seen that they are not to be considered as having 
been a part of the fighting force. Taking General McClellan's 
loss as stated, and also his statement of the number of the enemy 



22 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

buried after the battle, the statement that this one mile square had 
more men killed and wounded on it than any modern battlefield 
is substantially correct. 

"While we know absolutely what our losses were, those of the 
enemy as given are only approximately so, and if theirs was as 
great as ours the total loss will be near eighteen thousand. In all 
this terrible slaughter Indiana, represented as she was by only 
four infantry regiments and one of cavalry, and it only had six 
companies, played a conspicuous part. 

PART INDIANA PLAYED. 

"It is this that concerns us particularly today. Near the mid- 
dle bridge over Antietam creek was stationed the Third Indiana 
Cavalry, constituting as it did a part of the cavalry command of 
General Pleasanton. Although its loss, up to and including the 
Seventeenth, was not large, still it played a very important part. 
We can almost see where the Fourteenth Indiana stood in the 
bloody lane beyond the lookout we see from here. 

"The loss of this regiment was so enormous that we shudder 
now when we think of it. The men stood and died as only true 
and good soldiers can. They carried into the battle 320, and of 
this number 181 were killed and wounded. 

"The next is the Twenty-seventh. Just where the small piece 
of timber stops, looking west, we see where the regiment was first 
formed. Its left did not reach the timber, but will give an idea 
of its position. Its line extended to the right from there. The 
cornfield was in its front and about one hundred yards from it. 
You can see the ground from this point. In an open field, with 
the enemy at its front, and protected by the fence, you can imag- 
ine what a rich harvest death gathered that day. The regiment 
carried into battle 440 men and lost 209 killed and wounded. 

REGIMENT CUT TO PIECES. 

"The Nineteenth passed very near where we now stand in 
crossing the pike. Just beyond the farmhouse fell the knightly 
Bachman. This young, handsome and accomplished soldier was 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 23 

destined for a brilliant future had not death claimed him. This 
regiment stands at the head of all from the State in percentage 
of losses. It had been so cruelly cut to pieces at Second Bull Run 
and South mountain in the two weeks before, that the number it 
carried into action was small. Still it yielded up as a sacrifice 
nine killed and sixty-three wounded. The Seventh was at one 
time very near us, but from its position sustained but small loss. 
However, it was where it could be called for at any time. 

"Such, in brief, is the history of Indiana troops in this battle. 
They were but few, but they assisted in making for our State a 
great name. Colonel Fox, in his regimental losses, places the 
Fourteenth, Nineteenth and Twenty-seventh among the three 
hundred fighting regiments that sustained a loss in killed of more 
than ten per cent. These three are among the first twenty, while 
the Third Indiana Cavalry has the credit of having sustained the 
greatest loss according to its enrollment of any cavalry regiment. 
The Seventh Indiana in its subsequent service, especially in the 
Wilderness, shed honor on the State. 

"Governor Marshall, the commission having finished the work 
assigned it, now turns over to you, and through you to the State 
of Indiana, this monument. We have finished the work assigned 
us to the best of our ability. The commission desires to thank 
you for your hearty co-operation in this work, which will stand 
as a testimonial of what Indiana did on this battlefield to sustain 
and perpetuate the Union." 

And following this address, the Hon. Thomas R. Marshall, 
Governor of the State of Indiana, accepted the same in the ad- 
dress which follows, and on behalf of the State, and concluded by 
turning the same over to the United States Government, repre- 
sented on the occasion by Brigadier-General George B. Davis, 
Judge-Advocate General of the United States Army. 

"It may be inappropriate for me, a mere layman, to attempt 
upon this occasion any description of the Battle of Antietam. A 
half-score or more of experts have, in a paraphrase of Pilate, 
written what they have written. The man who went through that 



24 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

grim and gory day, eight and forty years ago, has recorded his 
impressions, drawn his conclusions, magnified the worth of his 
friends while excusing their mistakes, criticised his enemies, and 
spoken, as he thought, the final word. The student of the history 
of warfare has analyzed records, pored over maps, enlisted the 
varied feelings and emotions of the narrator who saw but a sec- 
tion of the day's doings, and then in the light shed by science of 
war, has written, as he presumed, the final judgment of history 
upon this ensanguined field. 

"It is impossible to reach any final, definite conclusions either 
by listening to the stories of the participants or by reading the 
accounts of that great day. Should you ask me why I, who am 
neither soldier nor historian, have dared upon this occasion to 
speak at all if I felt myself incompetent clearly to present in pan- 
oramic speech, the fierce encounter of the warring and tumultuous 
hosts joined that day in battle in a cause which each thought holy 
enough reverently and confidently to upbear to the throne of the 
God of Battles, it would please me to answer that out of the Babel 
of discordant and diverse facts and theories which the years have 
garnered into books and legends, there sounds one full clear note, 
trumpeting the truth that no braver nor more conscientious men 
ever struck steel on steel than when the swords flashed at Sharps- 
burg on September 17, 1862; and to answer that though I would 
gladly do more, I can do no less, sitting in the seat where once sat 
Indiana's great War Governor, than to voice the gratitude of 
Indiana's millions for the courage and consistency of their for- 
bears who here gladly fought and died that the Union of the 
Fathers might be the Union of the Sons. The hour and the occa- 
sion are justification for my presence; may they be extenuation 
for my failure to say the fitting word. 

"Notwithstanding the divergent views and varying conclu- 
sions, there are certain facts of interest about which there seems 
to be no dispute. He who stands at the flagstaff within this cem- 
etery is within the concave of the Confederate lines as they were 
drawn when the battle of that day began. Upon a pile of rock 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 25 

stood Robert E. Lee directing that fight, the close of which was to 
mark the receding tide of the Southern cause, which, gathering 
force next year, rose to high tide at Gettysburg and there forever 
broke. 

"Prophecy is sometimes by us called superstition. What we 
cannot explain, we theorize into knowledge. The dim unknown, 
if it produce like results from like causes, becomes for us the 
radiantly clear. He who calls on God, if he have faith in God, 
should expect God to answer. We should not trouble Divinity 
with our affairs unless we expect Him to judge. Incarnate, He 
gave no heed to forms of government nor conditions of men. His 
command to the Apostles was to preach the Gospel, not prove by 
Holy Writ that this or that was divine. If man will take the 
sword of the spirit and wield it with fleshly arm, he must expect 
the human institution which takes it up shall perish by it. For 
forty years the polemics of the church had been the religious 
aspect of slavery. Sundered by law and gospel from the State, 
the Church nevertheless raged and stormed around the system 
of human slavery. It may have been pure, but it certainly was 
not peaceable. This religious aspect of slavery put men out of 
fellowship at the North because they thought it was no business 
of the Church. It put them out of fellowship at the South be- 
cause they thought it was part of the Church's business. It 
damned them if they did, and it damned them if they did not. It 
shrieked 'it is right ; it is wrong ; it is Christian ; it is heathen ; 
judge us, oh, God!' It were impious for me to speak as though 
inerrant. I have heard no voice from Heaven say 'I will judge,' 
but this I know — that several conflicts of that fraternal strife 
raged and stormed around the visible tabernacle of Jehovah, and 
that of two of the bloodiest, one was at Shiloh Church and one 
around the Dunkard Church near the Potomac and the Antietam. 
Here, had we been present on that September day, we might have 
seen the Dunkard Church, the woods to the west, the intervening 
field and woods to the east. Here, we might have gazed upon 
what was the bloodiest conflict ever waged upon the American 



26 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

continent. Here, we might have seen one-half of Kimball's Bri- 
gade, composed of the One Hundred and Thirty-second Pennsyl- 
vania, Eighth Ohio and Fourteenth Indiana, go down in dust. If 
either religious or superstitious, we would have witnesed a dem- 
onstration, at least to the spiritual eye, of the truth of Holy Writ, 
that without shedding of blood there can be no remission of sin. 
Reverently and sorrowfully, yet not doubtingly, we would have 
felt that God pays, that He pays nations as He pays men. Inev- 
itably we would have come to believe that it was no mere chance 
which sent the thundering legions of Cromwell across old Eng- 
land, that it was not alone base-born ambition which made Na- 
poleon sweep Europe with the besoms of destruction. Call it 
what you will — superstition, fanaticism, religion, I venture the 
assertion that no survivor of that awful day hesitates to express 
a doubt that some unseen, mysterious, unknown power rules the 
destinies of men and nations. Can any man of Indiana who, that 
day, stripped body and soul and bared himself to death and dis- 
aster, be other than reverently fearful of the awful results of 
national sin? Now, as then, Hoosiers stand for that which they 
regard as truth and justice, for the equality of all men before the 
law, for the striking of the gyves from off the slave whether he be 
white or black. And the lesson of the conflict is one which might 
well be made the morning lesson of each day of national life, for 
it was here we began to realize that this is our land, not my land, 
that in civil as in religious government, there can be no rest until 
'whatsoever we would that men should do to us, we do even also 
unto them.' May it not be that when the spirits walk at night 
across this bloody battlefield, we might hear, if we but listened, 
voices telling us that as a people cannot take without payment in 
blood, directly, the toil of their brother man, so neither can they 
safely take that toil, indirectly. 

"This occasion is more than the dedication of a mere monu- 
ment or it is a vain occasion. To those participants in that fight 
who survive and to us who have come after, it should be a dedica- 
tion of our lives to the rights of man. And if we bring mere lip 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 27 

service to this sacred occasion, and do not approach it with a pur- 
pose as lofty and ideals as high as the purpose and ideals of the 
men who stood here eight and forty years ago, we may as well 
expect that sometime, the perturbed spirits of the men who fell 
that day will haunt us in an hour least expected, declaring that we 
have kept the letter of our love and loyalty for country to the ear 
but have broken it to the hopes of humankind. Yes, the occasion 
is more than the dedication of a mere monument. It is reopening 
the graves, disinterring the ashes, revivifying the dead, fill- 
ing the ranks of the five Indiana regiments which engaged in this 
conflict; it is standing the living and dead before the face of the 
men, women and children of the Hoosier State and bidding this 
day and age to look upon the spirit of that time and soberly to 
ask whether there can be a higher ideal for Indiana than a will- 
ingness to die or to live as God wills, for freedom, the constitu- 
tion and the Union. 

"Something more than mere heroism is marked by this shaft. 
Heroism is not the exclusive product of any age or clime. It may 
burst into bloom and fragrance as well in the lowlands as on the 
mountain-tops of life. It does not need to embrace the finer attri- 
butes of humankind. It may rise from the most trivial as well 
as from the most momentous causes. It may show itself phy- 
sically in the rescue of one from great danger. It may disclose 
itself intellectually as it did when Lincoln threw a Senatorship 
away that he might proclaim, 'a house divided against itself can- 
not stand; this country cannot exist half slave and half free.' It 
may be presumably moral as it was when the Monk of Erfurt in 
the presence of the princes, nobility and royalty of the Mother 
Church, avowed — 'Here I stand ; I cannot do otherwise, God 
helping me.' Heroism may be right, it may be wrong. 

"Nor does this monument mark bravery alone, as bravery is 
too largely racial in its characteristics. It is true that now and 
then the individual man rises above the common level of the intel- 
lectual, moral or physical cowardice of his race and counts all loss 
that he may say the thing he thinks or do the thing on which his 



28 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

heart is set. These instances, however, come rather within the 
definition of heroism than of bravery. In the main it is true that 
subject races and enslaved people are not brave. The quality 
which dares and does is that which belongs to a people standing 
always on the firing line of civilization, culture and progress. 

"I would hardly dare say that this monument does not mark 
enthusiasm, yet can anyone definitely tell whence arises enthus- 
iasm ? Men have thought they could trace its source to the fervid 
eloquence of orators, to the calm argument of statesmen or to 
the impending need of the hour. I doubt, however, if enthusiasm 
thus arises. I think that when the old Greeks coined the word, 
meaning as it does the gods striving within us, they knew better 
than we that it meant something which came from on high, and 
I dare to believe that enthusiasm for any cause comes in a strange, 
mysterious and unknown way; that it is as much a call to duty 
and endeavor and a girding of men to accomplishment, as though 
proclaimed by the trumpet tongue of angels and panoplied by 
power from above. It is always to be reckoned with as an im- 
portant factor in any conflict, spiritual, mental or physical. Men 
thus imbued with the rectitude of their conduct and the justice of 
their cause believe that one on God's side is a majority. 

"Nor does this monument mark the death of merely brave and 
courageous souls. Men have died since the dawn of history for 
every dream of hope and duty. It is not the cause for which a 
man dies that marks him as a brave and courageous soul. Those 
who well deserve the sneer and contempt of history, have marched 
as calmly to their deaths as those who have dared to die for a great 
cause. The races of the world have not always been imbued with 
high ideals and lofty purposes. It is true that civilization does 
go forward on a powder cart but sometimes it goes slowly. Men 
have died as bravely for the wrong as they have for the right. 
Heroes have sold their birthrights many a time for a mess of 
pottage, and women's wiles and women's smiles have cost the 
world in blood and carnage ofttimes as much as a splendid pur- 
pose. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 29 

"There has, however, been a race which has slowly but surely 
broadened along right lines as the centuries have elapsed. It is 
the Anglo-Saxon. At home and abroad it thought no peril too 
great, no conflict too vast, no sacrifice too large that it might im- 
press upon its own and subject peoples the reign of law. Then, 
that branch of it which dwelt this side the seas, enlarged still 
further the view and counted all else loss if thereby it could prove 
the right of man to govern himself. It was a long and weary 
task. Hearts grew sore and homes were made desolate. The 
eddying tides of battle for seven long years raged and roared and 
seethed along the American coast. At last the American Republic 
began its career. The Revolution in its inception was a war of 
men and principles, not of armies and interests. In victory and 
defeat these men were gradually but surely hammered into an 
army. Then peace and freedom came and for eighty years the 
quiet of the Republic was undisturbed save as the war of 1812 
and the war with Mexico rippled the surface of her universal 
calm. The hero, the brave man and the enthusiast all know how 
to die but no one of them is ever a soldier until the march, the 
lonely bivouac and the shriek and shrill of musketry and the roar 
of cannon have taught him that he is but a part of one great 
whole ; that for him duty, enthusiasm, heroism and bravery are all 
bound up in obedience to orders. During these eighty years, the 
men of the North had been devoting themselves exclusively to the 
peaceful pursuits of trade. They had killed nothing except the 
cattle on a thousand hills. They had no desire to draw a gun with 
deadly intent upon their fellowmen. They much preferred the 
windy war of words and fondly hoped, and hoping, thought that 
logic and law would never be replaced by grape and schrapnell. 
Their brethren of the South were of hotter blood ; they were prone 
to settle their grievances by the gun rather than by the law. They 
were born soldiers, and early in the century caught a glimpse of 
the irrepressible conflict which some day would come to pass. It 
is not speaking disparagingly of the men who flocked to the 
standard of the Union in 1861, to say they were not soldiers. 



30 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

They were heroes because they were impressed with the impelling 
necessity of flying to the relief of the Union. Many men have 
gladly died in the defense of their native land. They have thought 
it was a sweet and proper thing to do. The libations, which they 
have thus poured upon the altars of their country, have been 
sweet in the sight of the gods. Many men have died to add terri- 
tory to their native land. They have thought the sacrifice small 
if thereby they might advance the world-power of their people. 
Others have smilingly gone down into the valley and shadow to 
preserve wife and home, and they have felt that in the doing of 
it, they paid in small coin the debt of love they owed. But just 
here is revealed the real reason for this monument, and for the 
great glory of the men living and dead who from the standpoint 
of the North fought this fight. Here, there was no need to defend 
native land, to acquire territory or to preserve one's liberties or to 
protect wives, children and homes. Indiana was at peace. No 
home had been assailed. No man's rights had been taken from 
him. No danger from within or without threatened the peace of 
her citizens. Yet the shot which struck Fort Sumpter reverber- 
ated from every hill and through every valley of the State. It 
became a clarion call to duty and to endeavor, not only in Indiana 
but in every State. It helped to make the hero and was the audi- 
ble voice calling for the enthusiast. It brought together the 
grandest and the strangest army that the world ever saw, or 
rather, it brought together heroes and enthusiasts who in the 
crucible of war and on the anvil of defeat were melted and forged 
into an army which for all time to come will be a spectacle best 
beloved by the God of Battles. It was not, when first gathered 
together, an army, for men must not only be willing to fight, but 
they must know how to fight before they become an army. Indi- 
vidual instances of heroism and bravery are magnificent but they 
are not war. It is not speaking against that far-off Divine Des- 
tiny which declares that in the end the right shall triumph, to 
affirm with Napoleon, that the Lord is on the side of the heavy 
battalions. I hope that I shall not be considered either dreamer 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 31 

or partisan when I declare that the days preceding the 17th of 
September, 1862, as spent by the Army of Virginia and the Army 
of the Potomac, disclose that it was not war nor duty but that it 
was enthusiasm which kept our men from being swept off the face 
of the globe and which finally molded them into that vast fighting 
machine which saw its labors done at Appomattox. Duty grows 
old and cold, bravery is chilled but love and enthusiasm never fail. 
We stand amazed, with uncovered heads, when we think of the 
two battles of Bull Run, of Williamsburg, Fair Oaks, Gane's Mill 
and Malvern Hill. We watch with wonder the jealousies between 
the general officers and the civilians. We wonder how anything 
was accomplished. We are not surprised that in this September 
month a united people led by Lee and Longstreet, Hood, Stuart, 
into 'Maryland, my Maryland.' To my mind it is not strange 
the Hills and Jackson, came sweeping impetuously from the South 
that while we were thus molding our army, we did not succeed in 
sweeping the Confederates out of existence upon this battlefield. 
The wonder is that we did what we did. This monument marks 
not bravery alone nor heroism alone, but it marks the enthusiasm 
of men who were willing to sink their individuality in what they 
believed to be a great, common good ; it marks that enthusiasm 
which discloses the valor, forgetfulness and sacrifice of the indi- 
vidual man in a great cause, and that self-forgetfulness which is 
the surest sign of greatness. This monument cannot consecrate 
the lives of the men who fought here. Long before that day they 
had been set apart for the work they wrought. In the council 
chambers of creation they had been annointed with the Holy Oil 
of Consecration and had become a part of that great sacrifice 
which was necessary to make us one people indeed as we had long 
been one people in theory. 

"Eight and forty years have passed since the blood of these 
martyrs disappeared in the soil of Maryland. The invasion of the 
North was a tactical and political mistake. True it is, the next 
year, another invasion occurred and the high tide of rebellion was 
broken at Gettysburg, yet, when the sun went down on that 17th 



32 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

day of September, 1862, the leaves of the Judgment Book rustled 
open far enough for the keen-sighted man to see that the Republic 
was yet to endure for a while. Toil and privation and sacrifice 
were yet to be made but when made they were to be acceptable in 
liberty's cause. Those Hoosier boys died unknowing what was 
to be the issue of their sacrifice and yet it delights me to think that 
they died full of faith and without a lingering regret. We wonder 
how it was possible for all who have died for the cause to have 
dared thus to die without knowing what was to be the issue ; and 
yet there was this consolation : amid all the frowns of fortune 
they who die in a great cause do not die in vain. In the end, the 
world always doffs its hat to the man with convictions. This may 
not do him much good but it is of infinite value to the onward 
progress of mankind. It teaches us the littleness of our petty 
ambitions and of our personal desires and the largeness of the 
plans of the Eternal. It teaches more than this ; it teaches that 
he lives nobly and dies gloriously who lives and dies convinced of 
the justice of his cause. 

"But this occasion teaches most of all that a right thinking 
people will hold in sacred reverence the memory of the humblest 
man who fought to maintain the rights of men. That nation 
which forgets its traditions is far toward its decline. It can only 
live in the hopes and aspirations, the longings and loves of its 
youth. A green old age is kept green by a good green memory. 
A nation does well to embalm the story of its great men in prose 
and poetry. It does better to erect monuments and statues which 
will serve as an inspiration for oncoming generations. I have 
seen these splendid memorials to the valor, fidelity, courage, 
knowledge and statesmanship of the men of the olden time. I am 
not here to criticise nor to praise the great men who made history 
here between the Antietam and the Potomac. They have passed 
beyond my power to magnify or minimize their worth. It delights 
me to know that over all America in bronze and marble, their 
counterfeit presentments cheer the hearts of the young men of 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 33 

America. And yet, I feel that this is a far more splendid monu- 
ment than any which has been erected to an individual man. 

"I have come to discharge a splendid duty — the duty of conse- 
crating and dedicating this monument to the common soldiers of 
Indiana who thought life cheap if with it they might purchase a 
reunited people. Thoughtful men will agree that invaluable as is 
the character of leadership, equally invaluable is the character of 
the leader's following. The wisest of men can not get wisdom out 
of fools. The bravest of men can not draw courage from a cow- 
ard's veins. The greatness and the glory of a people never rest 
upon the shoulders of some tall, sun-crowned man. Both must 
rest upon the shoulders of the average man of the age. Grant and 
Sherman and Sheridan and Hancock and McClellan, all, would 
have been utter failures, however divinely endowed with military 
knowledge, had they not led men who knew that upon their indi- 
vidual bravery and obedience to orders rested the fate of battle. 

"It is a pleasing task, therefore, to here and now accept from 
this Commission, representing the Seventh, Fourteenth, Nine- 
teenth and Twenty-seventh Infantry and Third Cavalry, all vol- 
unteers for the preservation of the Union, and present to the Gov- 
ernment of the United States, this monument erected to the mem- 
ory of the Hoosier Boys whose names may be unknown outside 
the humble homes whence they came, but the fiber of whose souls 
was so strong that out of them has been woven a citizenship glor- 
ious beyond comparison. 

"I congratulate and thank the Commission for its efficient ser- 
vices, the State of Indiana for its loving memory and the Republic 
that She was the Mother of such Sons. May the Union accept it 
as a memorial of a safe past and an augury of a secure future." 

Accepting the monument on behalf of the United States, Brig- 
adier General Davis spoke as follows : 

"Your Excellency, Members of the Monument Commission, Mr. 
Chairman, Representatives of the Indiana Regiments, Ladies 
and Gentlemen : 

"The great Commonwealth of Indiana does well to pause for 



34 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

a moment in its career of abounding prosperity, to pay deserved 
tribute to her gallant sons, who, on this historic battlefield, by their 
valor and fortitude, did so much to make that Commonwealth 
illustrious. Her material advancement, her political and industrial 
development, and her abounding prosperity, were made possible 
by the sacrifices made here, nearly half a century ago, in defense 
of the integrity of the Union, and in support of the proposition 
that— 

" 'Government of the people, by the people, and for the people, 
should not perish from the earth.' 

"Of the Indiana regiments and batteries, whose records of 
soldierly efficiency and high devotion to duty are written large 
upon the rolls and standards of each of the great armies of the 
Union, four regiments of infantry, one regiment of cavalry, and 
two batteries of artillery, were diverted from the western armies 
and turning eastward, were assigned to duty with the Army of the 
Potomac. Few in numbers, but unequaled in those manly and 
heroic qualities that make for high soldiership, they participated 
in all the operations of that army, from the opening of the Penin- 
sular campaigns of 1862 to the close of the Gettysburg campaign, 
and some continued in eastern service until the final surrender of 
the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia in April, 1865. 

"The Seventh, Fourteenth, Nineteenth and Twenty-seventh 
Regiments of Indiana Infantry, and the Third Regiment of Cav- 
alry, were present and rendered memorable services in the stub- 
bornly contested battle which we here justly and appropriately 
celebrate. The First and Fifteenth Independent Batteries took 
part in the general operations of the Maryland campaign, and 
though not present on this historic field, rendered valuable service, 
in the gallant but unsuccessful defense of Harper's Ferry. Of 
the splendid regiments of infantry that took part in the battle of 
Antietam, one, the Fourteenth, lost fifty-seven per cent in killed 
and wounded in the operations of Hooker's First Army Corps on 
the Union right; another, the Twenty-seventh Infantry, of Sum- 
ner's Second Corps, lost forty-seven per cent in the desperate fight- 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 35 

ing at the Bloody Lane. The losses of the Nineteenth Indiana 
were a little over sixteen per cent, while those of the Seventh were 
less considerable. 

"No words of human eloquence can add to the story of heroic 
sacrifices which is told by these silent figures, which bear eternal 
testimony to the valor and resolution of the men of Indiana who 
achieved decisive victory at such awful cost: 

" 'How can fleeting words of human praise give the record of 
their glory? Our eyes suffused with tears, and blood retreating 
to the heart stirred with unwonted thrill, speak with the eloquence 
of nature uttered but unexpressed. From the din of the battle 
they have passed to the peace of eternity. Farewell, warrior, citi- 
zen, patriot, lover, friend ; whether in the humbler ranks, or bear- 
ing the sword of official power ; whether private, captain, surgeon, 
or chaplain ; for all these in the heady fight have passed away, — 
Hail ! and Farewell ! Each hero must sleep serenely on the field 
where he fell in a cause sacred to liberty and the rights of man- 
kind. — Governor John A. Adams, Massachusetts Inaugural Ad- 
dress/ 

"It is gratifying to know that these priceless services were 
fully recognized by the commanders under whom they were ren- 
dered. Colonel William Harrow, of the Fourteenth Regiment 
of Infantry, says, in his report of the battle of Antietam : 

" 'My officers and men without exception conducted them- 
selves with a courage and daring seldom equaled and never sur- 
passed. I cannot mention one without naming all. We went 
into the fight with 320 men and lost in killed and wounded 181. 

"Colonel Silas Colgrove, of the Twenty-seventh Regiment, 
says: 

" 'I am proud to be able to report to you that I believe every 
officer and man of my regiment who went into the fight with me 
did his whole duty. I saw no man or officer who took a back- 
ward step during the whole day unless ordered to do so.' 

"General McClellan, in his final report of the campaign, pays 
a deserving tribute to the glorious services rendered by the troops 



36 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

under his command, none of which were more worthy of distinc- 
tion than those performed by the regiments from Indiana: 

" 'I am devoutly grateful to God that my last campaign with 
this brave army was crowned with a victory which saved the 
nation from the greatest peril it had then undergone. I have not 
accomplished my purpose if, by this report, the Army of the 
Potomac is not placed high on the roll of the historic armies of 
the world. Its deeds ennoble the nation to which it belongs. 
Always ready for battle, always firm, steadfast, and trustworthy, 
I never called on it in vain; nor will the nation ever have cause 
to attribute its want of success, under myself or under other com- 
manders, to any failure of patriotism or bravery in that noble 
body of American soldiers. 

" 'No man can justly charge upon any portion of that army, 
from the commanding general to the private, any lack of devo- 
tion to the service of the United States Government and to the 
cause of the Constitution and the Union. They have proved their 
fealty in much sorrow, suffering, danger, and through the very 
shadow of death. Their comrades, dead on all the fields where 
we fought, have scarcely more claim to the honor of a nation's 
reverence than the survivors to the justice of a nation's gratitude.' 

"Can it be doubted for a moment, in view of what has been 
said, that the Indiana Regiments in the Army of the Potomac are 
entitled to share in the brief but heartening telegram, sent to the 
army by the President on receiving the news of the victory at 
South Mountain: 

" 'War Department, 
" 'Washington, September 15, 1862, 2:45 p. m. 

" 'Major General McClellan : Your dispatch of today re- 
ceived. God bless you and all with you. Destroy the rebel army 
if possible. 

" 'A. Lincoln.' 

"And now, in the name and on behalf of the Secretary of 
War, who is the representative of the President in the conduct 
of military affairs. I accept the monuments erected by the State 
of Indiana to commemorate the service of its soldiers on this his- 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 37 

toric field, made memorable by their valor and consecrated by 
their sacrifices. It is well that the Government which they did 
so much to preserve should charge itself with the custody and 
preservation of this beautiful and enduring monument, to services 
so illustrious, sacrifices so great, patriotism so inspiring. 

"In the spirit in which those services were rendered, the gen- 
eral government of the United States accepts from Your Excel- 
lency a custodianship which shall endure, I trust, until the earth 
and the sea shall give up their dead. 

The dedication closed with a selection of patriotic airs, and 
the audience dispersed. Many of the visitors from Indiana, who 
had not been upon the battlefield of Antietam for forty-eight 
years, with their wives, children and grand-children, improving 
the occasion to go over most of the field and especially those por- 
tions of it where their regiments had fought, and recounting inci- 
dents of the memorable 17th of September, 1862, still fresh in 
their minds. 

It was an especial source of gratification to the members of 
the Indiana Antietam Monument Commission, that the monu- 
ment they had erected to commemorate the gallantry of Indiana 
troops of Antietam field, met the approbation of all those who 
were permitted to behold it, and that so far, Indiana's monument 
surpasses in all respects, any memorial hitherto erected on that 
field. 

And in this connection, the Commission performs a most grat- 
ifying task in thanking Mr. John H. Lowe, the architect, for his 
work in planning the design of the monument, and in his prep- 
aration of the plans and specifications under which the work was 
carried out. We are glad to commend his work and to recom- 
mend him to those who may have like duties, as ourselves, for a 
workman of his kind to perform. 

The Commission feels that it has been exceedingly fortunate 
in both its architect and its builder, and especially so as this was 
its first essay in the building of monuments. 

The Antietam Battlefield is under the supervision of Captain 



38 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Charles W. Adams, who holds his position under the Secretary 
of War, and it is his special work to look after all government 
interests on the battlefield. He was of great assistance to the 
Commission throughout its entire work in connection with the 
construction of the Indiana monument, and especially in prepar- 
ing for and carrying out the plans for its dedication Captain 
Adams was untiring in his efforts to make the occasion a success. 
He is entitled to the hearty thanks of the Commission, and it is 
our pleasure to inform all persons who may have occasion to visit 
Antietam Battlefield, that from Captain Adams they will receive 
courteous attention of an honest servant of his government and a 
most honorable gentleman. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 39 



CHAPTER III. 



The Battle of Antietam. 

The battle of Antietam, recorded in history as having been 
fought on the 17th of September, 1862, on the west bank of An- 
tietam Creek and the uplands lying between that stream and the 
village of Sharpsburg, Maryland, in fact had its beginning on the 
afternoon of the 16th, when two corps of the Army of the Poto- 
mac, the First Corps under command of Major General Hooker, 
and the Twelfth Corps under command of Major General Mans- 
field, crossed Antietam Creek, in the vicinity of Keedysville, and 
engaged the left wing of the enemy in a fierce conflict, which 
lasted until dark, and resulted in driving back the enemy's line 
quite a distance. Here they rested during the night, and the con- 
test was renewed at daylight next morning on the line to which 
these two corps had advanced the evening before, and before noon 
of the 17th General Mansfield had fallen mortally wounded, and 
General Hooker had been carried from the field, so seriously 
wounded as to disable him from further service in the engage- 
ment. 

In this great battle, the Army of the Potomac was commanded 
by Major General George B. McClellan, and the Confederate 
Army, known as the Army of Northern Virginia, was com- 
manded by General Robert E. Lee, but this was by no means the 
first meeting of these two eminent commanders. 

On the 2d of April, 1862, Major General McClellan estab- 
lished his headquarters at Fortress Monroe, and from that point, 
as a base of operations at the head of the Army of the Potomac, 
as then constituted and numbering 100,000 men, began the mem- 
orable peninsular campaign, which contemplated the capture of 



40 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Richmond, and the overthrow of the Confederate Government. 

Here he was confronted by General Lee, at the head of the 
Army of Northern Virginia, and after many bloody engagements, 
with much loss on both sides, McClellan found his further prog- 
ress almost hopelessly stayed, and his army bottled up at Harri- 
son's Landing on the James River, forty-five miles from Rich- 
mond. There he remained inactive for a month, and as a condi- 
tion of a further attempt to advance upon Richmond insisted on 
an addition of 50,000 men to his army. 

This was found impossible, and as a result the Army of Vir- 
ginia was organized, and on the 26th of June, 1862, by a special 
order of the President of the United States, the command of this 
army was given to Major General John Pope, who, up to that 
time, had commanded successfully in the west. 

This new army as then constituted, consisted of the First 
Corps, commanded by Major General John C. Fremont, the Sec- 
ond Corps, commanded by Major General Nathaniel P. Banks, 
and the Third Corps, commanded by Major General Irving Mc- 
Dowell, and a body of troops at Alexandria, commanded by Brig- 
adier General Sturgis, as well as all the forces occupying the 
entrenchments in and around Washington. 

General Pope's command, according to his own statement, 
numbered 38,000 men badly scattered. 

General Fremont was relieved of command of the First Corps, 
and the command given to Major General Franz Siegel. 

General Pope concentrated his army at Culpepper, and began 
a forward movement towards the Rapidan River. 

He found Jackson's and Ewell's divisions of the Army of 
Northern Virginia in his front and ready to meet him. 

On the afternoon of August 9, 1862, the Second JCorps, under 
General Banks, and Jackson's division of the Army of Northern 
Virginia, met in bloody conflict at Cedar Mountain, which resulted 
in great slaughter on both sides, and the falling back of General 
Banks' forces. 

Other fighting followed, in which Siegel's Corps was active. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 41 

and on the 13th of August, from an autograph letter captured in 
the possession of General Stuart's Adjutant General, General 
Pope discovered that General Lee, with the Army of Northern 
Virginia, was moving northward with the design of overwhelm- 
ing Pope's army before it could be reinforced by troops from the 
Army of the Potomac, and seizing Washington and Baltimore. 

By an order of the President, Major General Halleck had be- 
come General-in-Chief of the Army on the 23d of July, 1862. 
This placed him above McClellan, as well as all other commanders 
in the field. He visited the Army of the Potomac on the 24th of 
July, one day after his appointment, and, on the 3d of August, 
over the protest of McClellan, ordered the withdrawal of the 
entire army from the peninsula, and directed that its several corps 
be hurried on to the relief of the Army of Virginia, under Pope. 

On the 24th of August, General McClellan found himself at 
Acqua Creek without an army, and with less than one hundred 
men including his staff. He reported this fact to the authorities 
at Washington and asked for orders, and was permittted to pro- 
ceed to Alexandria, where he established his headquarters. 

The Army of the Potomac was swallowed up in the Army of 
Virginia, under the command of General Pope. General Lee's 
plan to overwhelm everything in his front, capture Washington 
and Baltimore, invade the North, and end the war, seemed to be 
succeeding. In a series of bloody engagements beginning at the 
Rapidan, notwithstanding the reinforcements received from the 
Army of the Potomac, Pope's army was rolled back on the de- 
fenses of Washington. These, Lee did not venture to assail, but 
wheeling to the left, crossed the Potomac north of Washington, 
invaded Maryland, and northern soil, and established his head- 
quarters at Frederick. Here he issued his proclamation to the 
people of Maryland, in which he informed them that he had come 
to them as their deliverer. 

This brief recital of some of the events preceding the first 
Maryland campaign, we have deemed helpful to a better under- 



42 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

standing of that campaign, and the battle of Antietam, in which it 
ended. 

When Pope, with the Army of Virginia, took refuge behind 
the defenses at Washington, that officer was relieved from com- 
mand. In was an hour of trial to the nation. Two great experi- 
ments had failed. McClellan, with a splendid army, apparently 
devotedly attached to him, had fought the bloody battles of York- 
town, Williamsburg, Hanover Court House, Fair Oaks, Malvern 
Hills and Gains Farm, besides innumerable skirmishes, and after 
heavy losses had come to a standstill, miles away from the ob- 
jective of all his battles, and if not relieved of command, had been 
deprived of his army. Pope, who had been called to accomplish 
what McClellan had failed to accomplish, had also failed, and a 
great mass of disorganized troops, without other leader than the 
President himself, was occupying the capitol of the nation, which 
was one vast hospital, caring for the wounded, who had fallen in 
battle. 

This was the situation when McClellan was again directed by 
the President to reorganize the army, and plan a campaign against 
a victorious enemy. It was, perhaps, a predicament of chagrin, 
for both the head of the government and the man called upon once 
more to reorganize and lead its greatest army against a foe that 
had not known defeat. 

There was, perhaps, little confidence on the one hand, or grat- 
titude on the other, when this decision was reached. It was sim- 
ply a question of acting on an emergency and hoping for the best. 

That the outcome was what it was, under the circumstances, 
all the country had a right to expect. 

By one who was a member of the President's cabinet, and 
whose diary we have been permitted to read, it is recorded that 
McClellan was directed to move upon Lee's army, destroy it while 
on Northern soil, and end the war. That McClellan should be 
expected to destroy an army that had already whipped two of our 
best armies, on ground of their own choosing, in less than four 
months, seems, after forty-seven years, little short of remarkable. 




MAJOR GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLELLAN 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 43 

The soldiers called upon to do this fighting and win the expected 
victory, were the same that had been defeated in these two cam- 
paigns, and the commander expected to destroy his victorious 
enemy, was one of the commanders who had practically failed. 

That these same soldiers could be expected to do better or 
harder fighting than they had done in their two former campaigns, 
was hardly to be expected. The victory hoped for, could only be 
reasonably expected, except by the chances of war, something al- 
ways in doubt. 

President Hays, who, as the commander of a regiment, partici- 
pated in the Maryland campaign, until severe wounds prevented 
his further service, has said there were more men killed and 
wounded in the battle of Antietam than any other one day's fight- 
ing in the four years of the Civil War. Our loss was 12,410 men, 
and the Confederate loss was estimated at 15,000. In addition 
to being the bloodiest one day battle of the war, it, perhaps, came 
the nearest to being a fight to the finish for both sides, of any other 
battle of the war. Both armies had had enough, and sat down 
to look at each other for twenty-four hours, and in the last six 
hours of that twenty-four, General Lee decided he had better take 
his army and go back home, and this he did, by recrossing the 
Potomac in the night time of September 19. 

It is just to General McClellan, and all concerned, that what 
he did and how he did it, in this Maryland campaign, should be 
given in his own language as he saw the events of that dreadful 
time when all was fresh in his mind. For that reason we give his 
preliminary report written on the battlefield of Antietam on the 
15th of October, 1862. 

Headquarters Army of the Potomac, 

October 15th, 1862. 
General : 

I have the honor to submit a preliminary report of the military 

operation under my charge since the evacuation of Harrison's 

Landing. That measure directed by the General-in-Chief, was 

executed successfully, with entire safety to my command and its 



44 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

materiel between the 14th and 19th of August. The line of with- 
drawal selected was that of the mouth of the Chickahominy,'Wil- 
iamsburg and Yorktown. Upon this line the main body of the 
army with all its trains was moved, Heintzelman's Corps crossing 
the Chickahominy, Jones' Bridge, and covering by its march, the 
movements of the main column. The passage of the lower Chick- 
ahominy was by means of a bateau bridge 2000 feet in length. 
The transfer of the army to Yorktown was completed the 19th 
of August. The embarkation of troops and materiel at Yorktown 
and Fort Monroe was at once commenced, and as rapidly as the 
means of transportation admitted, everything was sent forward 
to Acquia Creek and Alexandria. 

I reached Acquia Creek with my staff on the 24th of August, 
reported my arrival, and asked for orders. On the 27th of Au- 
gust I received from the General-in-Chief permission to proceed 
to Alexandria, where I at once fixed my headquarters. The troops 
composing the Army of the Potomac were meanwhile ordered for- 
ward to re-enforce the army under General Pope. 

So completely was this order carried out that on the 30th of 
August I had remaining under my command only a camp guard 
of about one hundred men. Everything else had been sent to re- 
enforce General Pope. In addition I exhausted all the means at 
my disposal to forward supplies to that officer, my own head- 
quarters teams even being used for that purpose. 

Upon the unfortunate issue of that campaign, I received an 
intimation from the General-in-Chief that my services were de- 
sired for the purpose of arranging for the defense of the capital. 
They were at once cheerfully given, although while waiting defin- 
ite instructions at Alexandria I had endeavored, as just seen, to 
promote a favorable result in the operations then pending, and 
had thus contributed, though indirectly, yet as far as I could, to 
the defense of Washington. 

On the 2d of September the formal order of the War Depart- 
ment placed me in command of the fortifications of Washington 
"and of all troops for the defense of the capital." On the 1st of 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 45 

September I had been instructed that I had nothing to do with 
the troops engaged in active operations under General Pope, but 
that my command was limited to the immediate garrison of Wash- 
ington. On the next day, however, I was verbally instructed by 
the President and the General-in-Chief to assume command of 
General Pope's troops (including my own Army of the Potomac) 
as soon as they approached the vicinity of Washington ; to go out 
and meet them and post them as I deemed best to repulse the 
enemy and insure the safety of the city. 

At this time the task imposed upon me was limited to the dis- 
positions necessary to resist a direct attack of the enemy upon the 
capital. Such indeed was the danger naturally indicated by the 
defeat of our forces in front. The various garrisons were at 
once strengthened and put in order, and the troops were dis- 
posed to cover all the approaches to the city, and so as to be 
thrown upon threatened points. New defenses were thrown up 
where deemed necessary. A few days elapsed before comparative 
security was felt with regard to our ability to resist any attack 
upon the city. The disappearance of the enemy from the front 
of Washington and their passage into Maryland enlarged the 
sphere of operations, and made an active campaign necessary to 
cover Baltimore, prevent the invasion of Pennsylvania, and drive 
them out of Maryland. Being honored with the charge of this 
campaign, I entered at once upon the additional duties imposed 
upon me with cheerfulness and trust, yet not without feeling the 
weight of responsibilities thus assumed and being deeply im- 
pressed with the magnitude of the issues involved. 

Having made the necessary arrangements for the defense of 
the city in the new condition of things, I pushed forward the 
First and Ninth Corps, under Generals Reno and Hooker, form- 
ing the right wing under General Burnsides, to Leesborough, on 
the 5th instant; thence the First Corps, by Brookville, Cooks- 
ville, and Ridgeville, to Frederick ; and the Ninth Corps, by Da- 
mascus, on New Market and Frederick. The Second and Twelfth 
Corps, under Generals Sumner and Williams, on the 6th were 



46 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

moved from Tennallytown to Rockville thence by Middlebrook 
and Urbana, on Frederick, the Twelfth moving by a lateral road 
between Urbana and New Market, thus maintaining the com- 
munication between the center and right wing, as well as cover- 
ing the direct route from Fredrick to Washington. The Sixth 
Corps, under General Franklin, was moved to Darnestown on 
the 6th instant ; thence by Dawsonville and Barnesville, on Buck- 
eyestown, covering the road from the mouth of the Monocacy to 
Rockville, and being in position to connect with and support the 
center should it have been necessary (as was supposed) to force 
the line of the Monocacy. Couch's division was thrown forward 
to Offut's Cross Roads and Poolesville by the river road, thus 
covering that approach, watching the fords of the Potomac, and 
ultimately following and supporting the Sixth Corps. The object 
of these movements was to feel the enemy — to compel him to 
develop his intentions — at the same time that the troops were in 
position to cover Baltimore or Washington, to attack him should 
he hold the line of the Monocacy, or to follow him into Pennsyl- 
vania if necessary. 

On the 12th a portion of the right wing entered Fredrick, after 
a brisk skirmish at the outskirts of the city and in its streets. 
On the 13th the main bodies of the right wing and center passed 
through Fredrick. In this city the manifestations of Union 
feeling were abundant and gratifying. The troops received the 
most enthusiastic welcome at the hands of the inhabitants. 

On the 13th the advance, consisting of Pleasanton's cavalry 
and horse artillery, after some skirmishing, cleared the main 
passage over the Catoctin Hills, leaving no serious obstruction to 
the movement of the main body until the base of the South Moun- 
tain range was reached. 

While at Fredrick, on the 13th, I obtained reliable informa- 
tion of the movements and intentions of the enemy, which made 
it clear that it was necessary to force the passage of South Moun- 
tain range and gain possession of Boonsborough and Rohersville 
before any relief could be afforded to Harper's Ferry. On the 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 47 

morning of the 13th I received a verbal message from Colonel 
Miles, commanding at Harper's Ferry, that on the preceding 
afternoon, the Maryland Heights had been abandoned, after re- 
pelling an attack by the rebels and the whole force was concen- 
trated at Harper's Ferry, the Maryland, Loudoun and Bolivar 
Heights being all in possession of the enemy. The messenger 
stated that there was no apparent reason for the abandonment 
of the Maryland Heights, and that, though Colonel Miles asked 
for assistance, he said he could hold out certainly for two days. 
I directed him to make his way back, if possible, with the in- 
formation that I was rapidly approaching and would undoubt- 
edly relieve the place. By three other couriers I sent the same 
message with orders to hold out to the last. I do not learn that 
any of these messengers succeeded in reaching Harper's Ferry. 
I should here state that on the 12th I was directed to assume com- 
mand of the garrison at Harper's Ferry, but this order reached me 
after all communication with the garrison was cut off. Before 
I left Washington, while it was yet time, I recommended to the 
proper authorities that the garrison of Harper's Ferry should be 
withdrawn via Hagerstown, to aid in covering the Cumberland 
Valley, or that, taking up the pontoon bridge and obstructing the 
railroad bridge, it should fall back to Maryland Heights, and then 
hold its own to the last. In this position it should have main- 
tained itself for weeks. It was not deemed proper to adopt either 
of these suggestions, and when the subject was left to my dis- 
cretion it was too late to do anything except to try to relieve the 
garrison. 

I directed artillery to be fired frequently by our advance 
guards, as a signal to the garrison that relief was at hand. This 
was done, and I learn that our firing was distinctly heard at 
Harper's Ferry, and that they were thus made aware that we were 
approaching rapidly. It was confidently expected that this place 
could hold out until we had carried the mountains and were in 
a position to make a detachment for its relief. The left, there- 
fore, was ordered to move through Jefferson to the South Moun- 



48 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

tains, at Crampton's Pass, in front of Burkettsville, while the 
center and right moved up the main or Turner's Pass in front of 
Middletown. During these movements I had not imposed long 
marches on the columns. 

The absolute necessity of refitting and giving some little rest 
to troops worn down by previous long marching and severe 
fighting, together with the uncertainty as to the actual position, 
strength and intentions of the enemy, rendered it incumbent upon 
me to move slowly and cautiously until the headquarters reached 
Urbana, where I first obtained reliable information that the ene- 
my's object was to move on Harper's Ferry and the Cumberland 
Valley, and not upon Baltimore, Washington or Gettysburg. 

In the absence of the full reports of corps commanders, a 
simple outline of the brilliant operations which resulted in the 
carrying of the two passes through the South Mountains is all 
that at this time, with justice to the troops and commanders en- 
gaged, be furnished. 

The South Mountain range near Turner's Pass averages per- 
haps, 1,000 feet in height, and forms a strong natural military 
barrier. The practicable passes are not numerous and are readily 
defensible, the gaps abounding in fine positions. Turner's Pass 
is the more prominent being that by which the National road 
crosses the mountains. It was necessarily indicated as the route 
of advance of our main army. 

The carrying of Crampton's Pass, some five or six miles be- 
low, was also important to furnish the means of reaching the flank 
of the enemy, and having, as a lateral movement, direct relation 
to the attack on the principal pass, while it at the same time pre- 
sented the most direct practicable route for the relief of Harper's 
Ferry. 

Early in the morning of the 14th instant General Pleasanton, 
with a cavalry force, reconnoitered the position of the enemy, 
whom he discovered to occupy the crest of commanding hills in 
the gap on either side of the National road and upon advantageous 
ground in the center upon and near the road, with artillery bearing 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 49 

upon all the approaches to their position, whether that by the 
main road, or those by the country roads which led up around to 
the crest upon the right and left. At about 8 o'clock a. m. Cox's 
division of Reno's Corps, a portion of Burnside's Column, in 
co-operation with the reconnaisance, which by this time had be- 
come an attack, moved up the mountain by the old Sharpsburg 
road to the left of the main road, dividing, as they advanced, into 
two columns. These columns (Scammon's and Crook's) hand- 
somely carried the enemy's position on the crest in their front, 
which gave us possession of an important point for further oper- 
ations. Fresh bodies of the enemy were now appearing. Cox's 
position, though held stubbornly, became critical, and between 
12 and 1 o'clock p. m., Wilcox's division of Reno's Corps was 
sent forward by General Burnsides to support Cox ; between 2 
and 3 p. m. Sturgis' division was sent up. 

The contest was maintained with perseverance until dark, the 
enemy having the advantage as to position and fighting with ob- 
stinacy, but the ground won was fully maintained. The loss in 
killed and wounded here was considerable on both sides, and it 
was here that Major-General Reno, who had gone forward to 
observe the operations of his corps and to give such directions 
as were necessary, fell, pierced with a musket ball. The loss of 
this brave and distinguished officer tempered with sadness the 
exultations of triumph. A gallant soldier, an able general, en- 
deared to his troops and associates, his death is felt as an irre- 
parable misfortune. 

About 3 o'clock p. m., Hooker's Corps of Burnsides' column 
moved up to the left of the main road, which, bending to the 
right, then turning up the left, circuitously wound its way beyond 
the crest of the pass to the Mountain House on the main road. 
General Hooker sent Mead, with the division of the Pennsylvania 
Reserves to attack the eminence to the right of this entrance to 
the gap, which was done most handsomely and successfully. 

Patrick's Brigade, of Hatch's Division, was sent — one portion 
up around the road to turn the hill on the left, while the remain- 



50 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

der advanced as skirmishers up the hill, and occupied the crest, 
supported by Doubleday's and Phelp's Brigades. The movement, 
after a sharp contest on the crest and in the fields in the depres- 
sion between the crest and the adjoining hill, was fully successful. 

Rickett's Division pressed up the mountain about 5 p. m., ar- 
riving at the crest with the left of his command in time to par- 
ticipate in the closing scene of the engagement. Relieving Hatch's 
Division, Ricketts remained on the ground, holding the battlefield 
during the night. The mountain sides, thus gallantly passed over 
by Hooker on the right of the gap and Reno on the left, were 
steep and difficult in the extreme. We could make but little use 
of our artillery, while our troops were subject to a warm artillery 
fire as well as to that of infantry in the woods and under cover. 

By order of General Burnside, Gibbon's Brigade of Hatch's 
Division, late in the afternoon, advanced upon the center of the 
enemy's position on the main road. Deploying his brigade, Gib- 
bon actively engaged a superior force of the enemy, which, though 
stubbornly resisting, was steadily pressed back until some hours 
after dark, when Gibbon remained in undisturbed possession of 
the field. He was then relieved by a brigade of Sedgwick's Divi- 
sion. Finding themselves outflanked both on the right and left, 
the enemy abandoned their position during the night, leaving their 
dead and wounded on the field, and hastily retreated down the 
mountain. 

In the engagement at Turner's Pass our loss was killed, 

and 1,463 wounded and missing; that of the enemy is estimated to 
be, in all about 3,000. Among our wounded I regret to say were 
Brigadier-General J. P. Hatch and other valuable officers. 

The carrying of Crampton's Pass by Franklin was executed 
rapidly and decisively. Slocum's Division was formed upon the 
right of the road leading through the gap, Smith's upon the left. 
A line formed of Bartlett's and Torbert's Brigades, supported by 
Newton, whose activity was conspicuous, all of Slocum's Divi- 
sion, advanced steadily upon the enemy at a charge on the right. 
The enemy were driven from their position at the base of the 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 51 

mountain, where they were protected by a stone wall, and steadily 
forced back up the mountain until they reached the position of 
their battery, near the road, well up the mountain. Here they 
made a stand. They were, however, driven back, retiring their 
artillery en echelon, until, after an action of three hours, the crest 
was gained, and the enemy hastily fled down the mountains on the 
other side. On the left of the road Brook's and Irwin's Brigades, 
of Smith's Division, formed the protection for Slocum's flank, 
charged up the mountain in the same steady manner, driving the 
enemy before them until the crest was carried. 

On the morning of the 15th I was informed by civilians living 
on the other side of the mountains that the enemy was retreating 
in the greatest haste and in disordered masses to the river. There 
was such a concurrence of testimony on this point that there 
seemed no doubt as to the fact. The hasty retreat of the enemy's 
forces from the mountain, and the withdrawal of the remaining 
troops from between Boonsborough and Hagerstown to a position 
where they could resist attack and cover the Shepherdstown ford 
and receive the re-enforcements expected from Harper's Ferry, 
were for a time interpreted as evidence of the enemy's disorgan- 
ization and demoralization. 

As soon as it was definitely known that the enemy had aban- 
doned the mountains, the cavalry, and the Corps of Sumner, 
Hooker and Mansfield were ordered to pursue them, via the turn- 
pike and Boonsborough, as promptly as possible. The Corps of 
Burnside and Porter (the latter having but one weak division 
present) were ordered to move by the old Sharpsburg road, and 
Franklin to advance into Pleasant Valley, occupy Rohersville, and 
endeavor to relieve Harper's Ferry. Burnside and Porter, upon 
reaching the road from Boonsborough to Rohersville, were to re- 
enforce Franklin, or to move on Sharpsburg, according to cir- 
cumstances. Franklin movedtowardBrownsvilleandfound there 
a force largely superior in numbers to his own, drawn up in a 
strong position to receive him. Here the total cessation of firing 



52 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

in the direction of Harper's Ferry indicated but too clearly the 
shameful and premature surrender of that post. 

The cavalry advance overtook a body of the enemy's cavalry 
in Boonsborough which it dispersed after a brief skirmish, killing 
and wounding many, taking some 250 prisoners and 2 guns. 

Richardson's Division of Sumner's Corps, passing Boonsbor- 
ough, to Centerville or Keedysville, found a few miles beyond 
the town the enemy's forces displayed in line of battle, strong both 
in respect to numbers and position, and awaiting attack. Upon 
receiving reports of the disposition of the enemy, I directed all 
the corps except that of Franklin, upon Sharpsburg, leaving 
Franklin to observe and check the enemy in his front and avail 
himself of any chance that might offer. I had hoped to come up 
with the enemy during the 15th in sufficient force to beat them 
again and drive them into the river. My instructions were that if 
the enemy were on the march they were to be at once attacked; 
if they were found in force and in position, the corps were to be 
placed in position for attack, but no attack was to be made until 
I reached the front. 

In arriving at the front in the afternoon I found but two 
divisions — Richardson's and Sykes' — in position. The rest were 
halted in the road, the head of the column some distance in the 
rear of Richardson. After a rapid examination of the position, 
I found that it was too late to attack that day, and at once di- 
rected locations to be selected for our batteries of position, and 
indicated the bivouacs for the different corps, massing them near 
and on both sides of the Sharpsburg pike. The corps were not 
all in their places until the next morning some time after sunrise. 

On the 16th the enemy had slightly changed their line, and 
were posted upon the heights in rear of the Antietam Creek, their 
left and center being upon and in front of the road from Sharps- 
burg to Hagerstown, and protected by woods and irregularities 
of the ground. Their extreme left rested upon a wooded eminence 
near cross-roads to the north of J. Miller's farm, the distance at 
this point between the road and the Potomac river, which makes 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 53 

here a great bend to the east, being about three-fourths of a mile. 
Their right rested on the hills to the right of Sharpsburg, near 
Snavely's farm, covering the crossing of the Antietam and the 
approaches to the town from the southeast. The ground between 
their immediate front and the Antietam is undulating. Hills 
intervene, whose crests in general are commanded by the crests 
of others in the rear. On all favorite points their artillery was 
posted. It became evident from the force of the enemy and the 
strength of their position that desperate fighting alone could drive 
them from the field, and all felt that a great and terrible battle 
was at hand. 

The design was to make the main attack upon the enemy's 
left — at least to create a diversion in favor of the main attack, 
with the hope of something more by assailing the enemy's right — 
and, as soon as one or both of the flank movements were fully 
successful, to attack their center with any reserve I might then 
have on hand. 

The morning of the 16th (during which there was consid- 
erable artillery firing) spent in obtaining information as to the 
ground, rectifying the position of the troops and perfecting the 
arrangements for the attack. 

On the afternoon of the 16th Hooker's corps, consisting of 
Rickett's and Doubleday's divisions and the Pennsylvania Re- 
serves under Meade, was sent across the Antietam Creek by a 
ford and a bridge to the right of Keedyville, with orders to 
attack, and, if possible, to turn the enemy's left. Mansfield, with 
his corps, was sent in the evening to support Hooker. Arrived 
in position, Mead's division of the Pennsylvania Reserves, which 
was at the head of Hooker's corps, became engaged in a sharp 
contest with the enemy, which lasted until after dark, when it 
had succeeded in driving in a portion of the opposing line and 
held the ground. At daylight the contest was renewed between 
Hooker and the enemy in his front. Hooker's attack was success- 
ful for a time, but masses of the enemy, thrown upon his corps, 
checked it. Mansfield brought up his corps to Hooker's support. 



54 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

when the two corps drove the enemy back, the gallant and dis- 
tinguished veteran Mansfield losing his life in the effort. 

General Hooker was, unhappily, about this time wounded 
and compelled to leave the field, where his services had been con- 
spicuous and important. About an hour after this time Sumner's 
corps, consisting of Sedgwick's, Richardson's and French's divis- 
ions, arrived on the field — Richardson's some time after the other 
two, as he was unable to start as soon as they. Sedgwick, on the 
right, penetrated the woods in front of Hooker's and Mansfield's 
troops. French and Richardson were placed on the left of Sedg- 
wick, thus attacking the enemy towards their left center. Craw- 
ford's and Sedgwick's lines, however, yielded to a destructive 
fire of the masses of the enemy in the woods, and, suffering 
greatly, Generals Sedgwick and Crawford being among the 
wounded, their troops fell back in disorder; they nevertheless 
rallied in the woods. The enemy's advance was, however, en- 
tirely checked by the destructive fire of our artillery Franklin, 
who had been directed the day before to join the main army with 
two divsions, arrived on the field from Brownsville about an hour 
after, and Smith's division replaced Sedgwick's and Crawford's 
line. Advancing steadily it swept over the ground just lost, but 
now permanently retaken. The divisions of French and Richard- 
son maintained with considerable loss the exposed positions which 
they had so gallantly gained, among the wounded being General 
Richardson. 

The condition of things on the right towards the middle of the 
afternoon, notwithstanding the success wrested from the enemy 
by the stubborn bravery of the troops, was at this time unprom- 
ising. Sumner's, Hooker's and Mansfield's corps had lost heavily, 
several general officers having been carried from the field. I 
was at one time compelled to draw two brigades from Porter's 
(corps reserve) to strengthen the right. This left for the reserve 
the small division of regulars, who had been engaged in support- 
ing during the day the batteries in the center, and a single brigade 
of Morell's division. Before I left the right to return to the 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 55 

center I became satisfied that the line would be held without 
these two brigades, and countermanded the order, which was in 
course of execution. The effect of Burnside's movement on the 
enemy's right was to prevent the further massing of their troops 
on their left, and we held what we had gained. 

Burnside's corps, consisting of Wilcox's, Sturgis' and Rod- 
man's divisions, Cox's Kanawha Division, was intrusted with the 
difficult task of carrying the bridge across the Antietam, near 
Rohrback's farm, and assaulting the enemy's right, the order 
having been communicated to him at 10 o'clock a. m. The valley 
of the Antietam at and near this bridge is narrow, with high 
banks. On the right of the stream the bank is wooded and com- 
mands the approaches both to the bridge and the ford. The 
steep slopes of the bank were lined with rifle-pits and breastworks 
of rails and stones. These, together with the woods, were filled 
with the enemy's infantry, while their batteries completely com- 
manded and enfiladed the bridge and ford and their approaches. 

The advance of the troops brought on an obstinate and san- 
guinary contest and, from the great natural advantages of position, 
it was nearly 1 o'clock before the heights on the right bank were 
carried. At about 3 o'clock p. m. the corps again advanced, and 
with success, the right driving the enemy before it and pushing 
on nearly to Sharpsburg, while the left, after a hard encounter, 
also compelled the enemy to retire before it. The enemy here, 
however, was speedily re-enforced, and with overwhelming masses. 
The new batteries of their artillery were also brought up and 
opened. It became evident that our force was not sufficient to 
enable the advance to reach the town, and the order was given 
to retire to the cover of the hill which was taken from the enemy 
earlier in the afternoon. This movement was effected without 
confusion and the position maintained until the enemy retreated. 
General Burnside had sent to me for re-enforcements late in the 
afternoon, but the condition of things on the right was not such 
as to enable me to afford them. 

During the whole day our artillery was everywhere bravely 



56 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

and ably handled. Indeed, I cannot speak too highly of the 
efficiency of our batteries and of the great service they rendered. 
On more than one occasion when our infantry was broken they 
covered its reformation and drove the enemy back. The cavalry 
had little field for operation during the engagement, but was em- 
ployed in supporting the horse artillery batteries in the center, 
and in driving up stragglers while waiting opportunity for other 
service. 

The Signal Corps, under Major Myer, rendered, during the 
operations at Antietam as well as at South Mountain, and during 
the whole movement of the army, efficient and valuable service. 
Indeed, by its service here this corps has gallantly earned its title 
to an independent and permanent organization. 

With the day closed this memorable battle, in which perhaps 
nearly 200.000 men were for fourteen hours engaged in combat. 
We had attacked the enemy in position, driven them from their 
line on one flank, and secured a footing within it on the other. 
Under the depression of previous reverses we had achieved 
a victory over an adversary invested with the prestige of former 
successes and inflated with a recent triumph. Our forces slept 
that night conquerors on a field won by their valor and covered 
with the dead and wounded of the enemy. 

The night, however, presented serious questions ; morning 
brought with it grave responsibities. To renew the attack again 
on the 18th or to defer it with the chance of the enemy's retire- 
ment after a day of suspense, were the questions before me. A 
careful and anxious survey of the condition of my command, and 
my knowledge of the enemy's force and position, failed to im- 
press me with any reasonable certainty of success if I renewed 
the attack without re-enforcing columns. A view of the shattered 
state of some of the corps sufficed to deter me from pressing 
them into immediate action, and I felt that my duty to the army 
and the country forbade the risks involved in a hasty movement, 
which might result in the loss of what we had gained the previous 
day. Impelled by this consideration, I awaited the arrival of my 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 57 

re-enforcements, taking advantage of the occasion to collect to- 
gether the dispersed, give rest to the fatigued and remove the 
wounded. Of the re-enforcements, Couch's Division, although 
marching with commendable rapidity, was not in position 
until a late hour in the morning; and Humphrey's division of new 
troops, fatigued with forced marches, were arriving throughout 
the day, but were not available until near its close. Large re- 
enforcements from Pennsylvania, which were expected, did not 
arrive at all. 

During the 18th, orders were given for a renewal of the attack 
at daylight on the 19th. On the night of the 18th the enemy, 
after having been passing troops in the latter part of the day 
from the Virginia shore to their position behind Sharpsburg, as 
seen by our officers, suddenly formed the design of abandoning 
their line. This movement they executed before daylight. Being 
but a short distance from the river the evacuation presented but 
little difficulty. It was, however, rapidly followed up. 

A reconnaisance was made across the river on the evening of 
the 19th, which resulted in ascertaining the near presence of the 
enemy in some force and our capturing six guns. 

A second reconnaisance, the next morning, which, with the 
first, was male by a small detachment from Porter's corps, re- 
sulted in observing a heavy force of the enemy there. The de- 
tachment withdrew with slight loss. 

I submit herewith a list of the killed, wounded and missing 
in the enagements of the 14th and of the 16th and 17th. The 
enemy's loss is believed from the best sources of information to 
be nearly 30,000. Their dead were mostly left upon the fields, 
and a large number of their wounded were left behind. 

The object and result of this brief campaign may be summed 
up as follows : 

In the beginning of the month of September the safety of the 
National Capital was seriously endangered by the presence of a 
victorious enemy, who, soon after crossed into Maryland and 
then directly to Washington and Baltimore, while they occupied 



58 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

the soil of a loyal State and threatened an invasion of Pennsyl- 
vania. The Army of the Union, inferior in numbers, wearied 
by long marches, deficient in various supplies, worn out by 
numerous battles, the last of which had not been successful, first 
covered by its movements, the important cities of Washington 
and Baltimore, then boldly attacked the victorious enemy in their 
chosen strong position and drove them back, with all their 
superiority of numbers, into the State of Virginia, thus saving 
the loyal States from invasion and rudely dispelling the Rebel 
dreams of carrying the war into our country and subsisting upon 
our resources. Thirteen guns and thirty-nine colors, more than 
15,000 stands of small arms and more than 6,000 prisoners were 
the trophies which attest the success of our arms. 

Rendering thanks to Divine Providence for its blessing upon 
our exertions, I close this brief report. I beg only to add the 
hope that the army's efforts for the cause in which we are en- 
gaged will be deemed worthy to receive the commendation of the 
Government and the country. 

Geo. B. McClEixan, 
Major-General U. S. Army. 
Brig. Gen. Lorenzo Thomas, 

Adjutant-General, U. S. Army. 

Various military organizations that had not been a part of the 
Army of the Potomac prior to its reorganization in September, 
1862, for the Maryland campaign, but had been performing mil- 
itary duty in commands independent of that army, under the new 
order of things became a part of the reorganized army, and a 
number of organizations that had been, either a part of the Army 
of Virginia or of the Army of the Potomac, were, in the make up 
of the new army, detached, and so far as the Maryland campaign 
of 1862 was concerned, such organizations were not a part of 
that army. Such was true of certain military organizations 
from the State of Indiana. The Seventh, Fourteenth, Nineteenth, 
Twentieth and Twenty-seventh Regiments of Indiana Infantry, 
and the Sixteenth Indiana Battery of Light Artillery, had all 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 59 

been a part of the Army of Virginia, and had performed heroic 
service under General Pope, while the battallion of six com- 
panies of the Third Indiana Cavalry, for some weeks prior to 
the 1st of September, 1862, had been a part of the independent 
command of General Rufus King, at Fredricksburg, Virginia. 

In the reorganization, begun on the 1st of September, 1862, 
the Twentieth Indiana Infantry and the Sixteenth Indiana Bat- 
tery of Light Artillery were detached and left at Washington, 
while the other Indiana organizations that had been a part of 
the Army of Virginia, and the Battallion of the Third Indiana 
Cavalry, which had not belonged to either army, were now in- 
cluded in the reorganized army. 

In view of the fact that in the enactment of the law under 
which our commission exists there was some question as to what 
military organizations from Indiana actually had part in the battle 
of Antietam on the 17th of September, 1862, we here give the 
organization of the Army of the Potomac, compiled from the 
records of the Adjutant General's office, as constituted at the 
date of that memorable battle. 



60 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 



CHAPTER IV. 



Organization of the Army of the 
Potomac. 

Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan, U. S. Army, 
Commanding. 

September 14-17, 1862. 
GENERAL HEADQUARTERS. 

Hscort. 

Capt. James B. McIntyre. 

Independent Company Oneida, New York, Cavalry, Capt. Daniel 
P. Mann. 

Fourth U. S. Cavalry, Company A, Lieut. Thomas H. McCormick. 

Fourth U. S. Cavalry; Company E, Capt. James B. McIntyre. 

Provost Guard. 

Maj. Wieeiam H. Wood. 

Second U. S. Cavalry, Companies E, F, H and G, Capt. George 

A. Gordon. 
Eighth U. S. Infantry, Companies A, D, F and G, Capt. Royal 

T. Frank. 
Nineteenth U. S. Infantry, Company G, Capt. Edmund L. Smith. 
Nineteenth U. S. Infantry, Company H, Capt. Henry S. Welton. 

Headquarters Guard. 
Ninety-third New York, Lieut. Col. Benjamin C. Butler. 

Quartermasters Guard. 

First U. S. Cavalry, Companies B, C, H and I, Capt. Marcus A. 
Reno. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 61 

FIRST ARMY CORPS. 

(1) Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker. 

(2) Brig. Gen. George G. Meade. 

Escort. 

Second New York Cavalry, Companies A, B, I and K, Capt. John 
E. Naylor. 

FIRST DIVISION. 
Brig. Gen. Abner Doubleday. 

First Brigade. 
Col. Waeter Phelps, Jr. 
Twenty-second New York, Col. John McKie, Jr. 
Twenty-fourth New York, Capt. John D. O'Brian. 
Thirtieth New York, Col. William M. Searing. 
Eighty-fourth New York (Fourteenth Militia), Maj. William H. 

de Bevoice. 
Second U. S. Sharpshooters, Col. Henry A. V. Post. 

Second Brigade. 

(1) Brig. Gen. Abner Doubeeday. 

(2) Col. William P. Wainwright. 

(3) Lieut. Col. J. Fimmain Hoffmann. 
Seventh Indiana, Maj. Ira G. Grover. 

Seventy-sixth New York, Col. William P. Wainwright, Capt. John 

W. Young. 
Ninety-fifth New York, Maj. Edward Pye. 

Thirty-sixth Pennsylvania, Lieut. Col. William J. Hoffmann, 
Capt. Frederick Williams. 

Third Brigade. 

Brig. Gen. Marsena R. Patrick. 

Twenty-first New York, Col. William F. Rogers. 

Twenty-third New York, Col. Henry C. Hoffman. 

Thirty-fifth New York, Col. Newton B. Lord. 

Eightieth New York (Twentieth Militia), Lieut. Col. Theodore 
B. Gates. 



62 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Fourth Brigade. 
Brig. Gen. John Gibbon. 

Nineteenth Indiana, Col. Solomon Meredith, Lieut. Col. Alois O. 

Bachman, Capt. William W. Dudley. 
Second Wisconsin, Col. Lucius Fairchild, Lieut. Col. Thomas S. 

Allen. 
Sixth Wisconsin, Lieut. Col. Edward S. Bragg, Maj. Rufus R. 

Dawes. 
Seventh Wisconsin, Capt. John B. Callis. 

ARTILLERY. 

Capt. J. Albert Monroe. 
New Hampshire Light, First Battery, Lieut. Fredrick M. Edgell. 
First Rhode Island Light, Battery D, Capt. J. Albert Monroe. 
First New York Light, Battery L, Capt. John A. Reynolds. 
Fourth U. S., Battery B, Capt. Joseph B. Campbell, Lieut. James 
Stewart. 

SECOND DIVISION. 
Brig. Gen. James B. Ricketts. 

First Brigade. 
Brig. Gen. Abram Duryea. 
Ninety-seventh New York, Maj. Charles Northrup. 
One Hundred Fourth New York, Maj. Lewis C. Skinner. 
One Hundred Fifth New York, Col. Howard Carroll. 
One Hundred Seventh Pennsylvania, Capt. James Mac Thompson. 

Second Brigade. 

(1) Col. William A. Christian. 

(2) Col. Peter Lyle. 

Twenty-sixth New York, Lieut. Col. Richard H. Richardson. 

Ninety-fourth New York, Col. Calvin Littlefield. 

Eighty-eighth Pennsylvania, Lieut. Col. George W. Gile, Capt. 

Henry R. Myres. 
Ninetieth Pennsylvania, Col. Peter Lyle, Lieut. Col. William A. 

Leech. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 63 

Third Brigade. 

( 1 ) Brig. Gen. George L. Hartsuff. 

(2) Col. Richard Coulter. 

Sixteenth Massachusetts, Maj. Elisha Burbank, Capt. Benjamin 

F. Cook. 
Thirteenth Massachusetts, Maj. J. Parker Gould. 
Eighty-third New York (Ninth Militia), Lieut. Col. William At- 

terbury. 
Eleventh Pennsylvania, Col. Richard Coulter, Capt. David M. 

Cook. 

ARTILLERY. 

First Pennsylvania Light, Battery F, Capt. Ezra W. Matthews. 
Pennsylvania Light, Battery C, Capt. James Thompson. 

THIRD DIVISION. 

(1) Brig. Gen. George G. Meade. 

(2) Brig. Gen. Truman Seymour. 

First Brigade. 

(1) Brig. Gen. Truman Seymour. 

(2) Col. R. Biddle Roberts. 

First Pennsylvania Reserves, Col. R. Biddle Roberts, Capt. Wil- 
liam C. Tally. 

Second Pennsylvania Reserves, Capt. James N. Byrnes. 

Fifth Pennsylvania Reserves, Col. Joseph W. Fisher. 

Sixth Pennsylvania Reserves, Col. William Sinclair. 

Thirteenth Pennsylvania Reserves, Col. Hugh W. McNeil, Capt. 
Dennis McGee. 

Second Brigade. 
Col. Albert L. Magilton. 
Third Pennsylvania Reserves, Lieut. Col. John Clark. 
Fourth Pennsylvania Reserves, Maj. John Nyce. 
Seventh Pennsylvania Reserves, Col. Henry C. Bolinger, Maj. 

Chauncy A. Lyman. 
Eighth Pennsylvania Reserves, Maj. Silas M. Baily. 



64 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Third Brigade. 
Lieut. Col. Robert Anderson. 

Ninth Pennsylvania Reserves, Lieut. Col. Robert Anderson, Capt. 

Samuel B. Dick. 
Tenth Pennsylvania Reserves, Lieut. Col. Adoniram J. Warner, 

Capt. Josiah P. Smith. 
Eleventh Pennsylvania Reserves, Col. Samuel M. Jackson. 
Twelfth Pennsylvania Reserves, Capt. Richard Gustin. 

ARTILLERY. 
First Pennsylvania Light, Battery A, Lieut. John G. Simpson. 
First Pennsylvania Light, Battery B, Capt. James H. Cooper. 
Fifth U. S., Battery C, Capt. Dunbar R. Ransom. 

SECOND ARMY CORPS. 

Escort. 
Maj. Gen. Edwin V. Sumner. 
Sixth New York Cavalry, Company D, Capt. Henry W. Lyon. 
Sixth New York Cavalry, Company K, Capt. Riley Johnson. 

FIRST DIVISION. 

(1) Maj. Gen. Israel B. Richardson. 

(2) Brig. Gen. John C. Caldwell. 

(3) Brig. Gen. Winfield S. Hancock. 

First Brigade. 
Brig. Gen. John C. Caldwell. 
Fifth New Hampshire, Col. Edward E. Cross. 
Seventh New York, Capt. Charles Brestel. 
Sixty-first New York, Col. Francis C. Barlow. 
Sixty-fourth New York, Lieut. Col. Nelson A. Miles. 
Eighty-first Pennsylvania, Maj. H. Boyd McKeen. 

Second Brigade. 

(1) Brig. Gen. Thomas F. Meagher. 

(2) Col. John Burke. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 65 

Twenty-ninth Massachusetts, Lieut. Col. Joseph H. Barnes. 

Sixty-third New York, Col. John Burke, Lieut. Col. Henry Fow- 
ler, Maj. Richard C. Bentley, Capt. Joseph O'Neill. 

Sixty-ninth New York, Lieut. Col. James Kelly, Maj. James 
Cavanaugh. 

Eighty-eighth New York, Lieut. Col. Patrick Kelly. 

Third Brigade. 
Col. John R. Brooke. 
Second Delaware, Capt. David L. Striker. 
Fifty-second New York, Col. Paul Frank. 
Fifty-seventh New York, Lieut. Col. Philip J. Parisen, Maj. Al- 

ford B. Chapman. 
Sixty-sixth New York, Capt. Julius Wehle, Lieut. Col. James H. 

Bull. 
Fifty-third Pennsylvania, Lieut. Col. Richard McMichael. 

ARTILLERY. 

First New York Light, Battery B, Capt. Rufus D. Pettit. 
Fourth U. S., Batteries A and C, Lieut. Evan Thomas. 

SECOND DIVISION. 

(1) Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick. 

(2) Brig. Gen. Oliver O. Howard. 

First Brigade. 
Brig. Gen. Willis A. Gorman. 

Fifteenth Massachusetts, Lieut. Col. John W. Kimball. 

First Minnesota, Col. Alfred Sully. 

Thirty-fourth New York, Col. James Suiter. 

Eighty-third New York (Second Militia), Col. Henry W. Hud- 
son. 

Massachusetts Sharpshooters, First Company, Capt. John Saun- 
ders. 

Massachusetts Sharpshooters, Second Company, Capt. William 
F. Russell. 



66 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Second Brigade. 

(1) Brig. Gen. Oliver O. Howard. 

(2) Col. Joshua T. Owen. 

(3) Col. DeWitt C. Baxter. 

Sixty-ninth Pennsylvania, Col. Joshua T. Owen. 

Seventy-first Pennsylvania, Col. Isaac J. Wistar, Lieut. Richard 

P. Smith (adjutant), Capt. Enoch E. Lewis. 
Seventy-second Pennsylvania, Col. DeWitt C. Baxter. 
One Hundred Sixth Pennsylvania, Col. Turner G. Morehead. 

Third Brigade. 

(1) Brig. Gen. Napoleon J. T. Dana. 

(2) Col. Norman J. Hall. 

Nineteenth Massachusetts, Col. Edward W. Hinks, Lieut. Col. 

Arthur F. Devereux. 
Twentieth Massachusetts, Col. William R. Lee. 
Seventh Michigan, Col. Norman J. Hall, Capt. Charles J. Hunt. 
Forty-second New York, Lieut. Col. George N. Bomford, Maj. 

James E. Mallon. 
Fifty-ninth New York, Col. William L. Tindall. 

ARTILLERY. 
First Rhode Island Light, Battery A, Capt. John A. Tompkins. 
First U. S., Battery I, Lieut. George A. Woodruff. 

THIRD DIVISION. 
Brig. Gen. William H. French. 

First Brigade. 
Brig. Gen. Nathan Kimball. 

Fourteenth Indiana, Col. William Harrow. 
Eighth Ohio, Lieut. Col. Franklin Sawyer. 

One Hundred Thirty-second Pennsylvania, Col. Richard A. Oak- 
ford, Lieut. Col. Vincent M. Wilcox. 
Seventh West Virginia, Col. Joseph Snider. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 67 

Second Brigade. 

Col. Dwight Morris. 

Fourteenth Connecticut, Lieut. Col. Sanford H. Perkins. 
One Hundred Eighth New York, Col. Oliver H. Palmer. 
One Hundred Thirtieth Pennsylvania, Col. Henry I. Zinn. 

Third Brigade. 

(1) Brig. Gen. Max Weber. 

(2) Col. John W. Andrews. 

First Delaware, Col. John W. Andrews, Lieut. Col. Oliver Hop- 

kinson. 
Fifth Maryland, Maj. Leopold Blumenberg, Capt. E. F. M. 

Fachtz. 
Fourth New York, Lieut. Col. John D. McGregor. 

UNATTACHED ARTILLERY. 

First New York Light, Battery G, Capt. John D. Frank. 
First Rhode Island Light, Battery B, Capt. John G. Hazard. 
First Rhode Island Light, Battery G, Capt. Charles D. Owen. 

FOURTH ARMY CORPS. 

FIRST DIVISION. 
Maj. Gen. Darius N. Couch. 

First Brigade. 

Brig. Gen. Charles Devens, Jr. 

Seventh Massachusetts, Col. David A. Russell. 
Tenth Massachusetts, Col. Henry L. Eustis. 
Thirty-sixth New York, Col. William H. Browne. 
Second Rhode Island, Col. Frank Wheaton. 

Second Brigade. 

Brig. Gen. Albion P. Howe. 

Sixty-second New York, Col. David J. Nevin. 

Ninety-third Pennsylvania, Col. James M. McCarter. 

Ninety-eighth Pennsylvania, Col. John F. Ballier. 

One Hundred Second Pennsylvania, Col. Thomas L. Rowley. 

One Hundred Thirty-ninth Pennsylvania. Col. Frank H. Collier. 



68 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Third Brigade. 
Brig. Gen. John Cochrane. 

Sixty-fifth New York, Col. Alexander Shaler. 
Sixty-seventh New York, Col. Julius W. Adams. 
One Hundred Twenty-second New York, Col. Silas Titus. 
Twenty-third Pennsylvania, Col. Thomas H. Neill. 
Sixty-first Pennsylvania, Col. George C. Spear. 
Eighty-second Pennsylvania, Col. David H. Williams. 

ARTILLERY. 
New York Light, Third Battery, Capt. William Stuart. 
First Pennsylvania Light, Battery C, Capt. Jeremiah McCarthy. 
First Pennsylvania Light, Battery D, Capt. Michael Hall. 
Second U. S., Battery G, Lieut. John H. Butler. 

FIFTH ARMY CORPS. 

Escort. 
Ma j. Gen. Fitz John Porter. 
First Maine Cavalry (detachment), Capt. George J. Summat. 

FIRST DIVISION. 
Maj. Gen. George W. Morell. 

First Brigade. 
Col. James Barnes. 

Second Maine, Col. Charles W. Roberts. 
Eighteenth Massachusetts, Lieut. Col. Joseph Hays. 
Twenty-second Massachusetts, Lieut. Col. William S. Tilton. 
First Michigan, Capt. Emory W. Belton. 
Thirteenth New York, Col. Elisha G. Marshall. 
Twenty-fifty New York, Col. Charles A. Johnson. 
One Hundred Eighteenth Pennsylvania, Col. Charles M. Prevost. 
Massachusetts Sharpshooters, Second Company, Capt. Lewis E. 
Wentworth. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 69 

Second Brigade. 
Brig. Gen. Charles Griffin. 
Second District of Columbia, Col. Charles M. Alexander. 
Ninth Massachusetts, Col. Patrick H. Guiney. 
Thirty-second Massachusetts, Col. Francis J. Parker. 
Fourth Michigan, Col. Jonathan W. Childs. 
Fourteenth New York, Col. James McQuade. 
Sixty-second Pennsylvania, Col. Jacob B. Sweitzer. 

Third Brigade. 
Col. T. B. W. Stockton. 

Twentieth Maine, Col. Adelbert Ames. 
Sixteenth Michigan, Lieut. Col. Norval E. Welch. 
Twelfth New York, Capt. William Huson. 
Seventeenth New York, Lieut. Col. Nelson B. Bartram. 
Forty- fourth New York, Maj. Freeman Conner. 
Eighty-third Pennsylvania, Capt. Orpheus S. Woodward. 
Michigan Sharpshooters, Brady's Company, Lieut. Jonas. H. 
Titus, Jr. 

ARTILLERY. 

Massachusetts Light, Battery C, Capt. Augustus P. Martin. 
First Rhode Island Light, Battery C, Capt. Richard Waterman. 
Fifth U. S., Battery D, Lieut. Charles E. Hazlett. 

SHARPSHOOTERS. 
First U. S., Capt. John B. Isler. 

SECOND DIVISION. 
Brig. Gen. George Sykes. 

First Brigade. 
Lieut. Coe. Robert C. Buchanan. 

Third U. S., Capt. John D. Wilkins. 

Fourth U. S., Capt. Hiram Dryer. 

Twelfth U. S., First Battallion, Capt. Mathew M. Blunt. 

Fourteenth U. S., First Battallion, Capt. C. Harvey Brown. 

Fourteenth U. S., Second Battallion, Capt. David B. McKibbem 



70 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Second Brigade. 
Maj. Charles S. Lovell. 
First and Sixth U. S., Capt. Levi C. Bootes. 
Second and Tenth U. S., Capt. John S. Poland. 
Eleventh U. S., Capt. DeL. Floyd Jones. 
Seventeenth U. S., Maj. George L. Andrews. 

Third Brigade. 
Col. Gouverneur K. Warren. 
Fifth New York, Capt. Cleveland Winslow. 
Tenth New York, Lieut. Col. John W. Marshall. 

ARTILLERY. 
First U. S., Batteries E and G, Lieut. Alanson M. Randol. 
Fifth U. S., Battery I, Capt. Stephen H. Weed. 
Fifth U. S., Battery K, Lieut. William E. Van Reed. 

THIRD DIVISION. 
Brig. Gen. Andrew A. Humphreys. 

First Brigade. 
Ninetieth Pennsylvania, Col. Edgar M. Gregory. 
One Hundred Twenty-sixth Pennsylvania, Col. James G. Elder. 
One Hundred Twenty-ninth Pennsylvania, Col. Jacob G. Frick. 
One Hundred Thirty-fourth Pennsylvania, Col. Matthew Quay. 

Second Brigade. 
One Hundred Twenty-third Pennsylvania, Col. John B. Clark. 
One Hundred Thirty-first Pennsylvania, Lieut. Col. William B. 

Shant. 
One Hundred Thirty-third Pennsylvania, Col. Franklin B. Speak- 

man. 
One Hundred Fifty-fifth Pennsylvania, Col. Edward J. Allen. 

ARTILLERY. 
First New York Light, Battery C, Capt. Almont Barnes. 
First Ohio Light, Battery L, Capt. Lucius N. Robinson. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 71 

ARTILLERY RESERVE. 

First Battallion New York Light, Battery A, Lieut. Bernhard 

Wever. 
First Battallion New York Light, Battery B, Lieut. Alfred Von 

Kleiser. 
First Battallion New York Light, Battery C, Capt. Robert Langer. 
First Battallion New York Light, Battery D, Capt. Charles 

Krusserow. 
New York Light, Fifth Battery, Capt. Elijah D. Taft. 
First U. S., Battery K, Capt. William M. Graham. 
Fourth U. S., Battery G, Lieut. Marcus P. Miller. 

SIXTH ARMY CORPS. 

Escort. 

Maj. William B. Franklin. 

Sixth Pennsylvania Cavalry, Companies B and G, Capt. Henry P. 
Muirheld. 

FIRST DIVISION. 
Maj. Henry W. Slocum. 

First Brigade. 
Col. Alfred T. A. Torbert. 

First New Jersey, Lieut. Col. Mark N. Collette. 
Second New Jersey, Col. Samuel L. Buck. 
Third New Jersey, Col. Henry W. Brown. 
Fourth New Jersey, Col. William B. Hatch. 

Second Brigade. 
Col. Joseph J. Bartlett. 

Fifth Maine, Col. Nathaniel J. Jackson. 
Sixteenth New York, Lieut. Col. Joel J. Seaver. 
Twenty-seventh New York, Lieut. Col. Alexander B. Adams. 
Ninety-sixth Pennsylvania, Col. Henry L. Cake. 



72 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Third Brigade. 
Brig. Gen. John Newton. 

Eighteenth New York, Lieut. Col. George R. Myres. 
Thirty-first New York, Lieut. Col. Francis E. Pinto. 
Thirty-second New York, Col. Fredrick Matheson, Maj. George 

E. Lemon. 
Ninety-fifth Pennsylvania, Col. Gustavus W. Towne. 

ARTILLERY. 

Maryland Light, Battery A, Capt. John W. Wolcott. 
Massachusetts Light, Battery A, Capt. Josiah Porter. 
New Jersey Light, Battery A, Capt. William Hexamer. 
Second U. S., Battery D, Lieut. Edward B. Williston. 

SECOND DIVISION. 

Maj. Gen. Wieuam F. Smith. 

First Brigade. 
(2) Col. Amasa Cobb. 
(1) Brig. Gen. Wineield S. Hancock. 

Sixth Maine, Col. Hiram Burnham. 

Forty-third New York, Maj. John Wilson. 

Forty-ninth Pennsylvania, Col. William Brisbane. 

One Hundred Thirty-seventh Pennsylvania, Col. Henry M. Bes- 

sert. 
Fifth Wisconsin, Col. Amasa Cobb. 

Second Brigade. 
Brig. Gen. W. T. H. Brookes. 

Second Vermont, Maj. James H. Walbridge. 

Third Vermont, Col. Breed N. Hyde. 

Fourth Vermont, Lieut. Col. Charles B. Stoughton. 

Fifth Vermont, Col. Lewis A. Grant. 

Sixth Vermont, Maj. Oscar L. Tuttle. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 73 

Third Brigade. 
Col. William H. Irwin. 

Seventh Maine, Maj. Thomas W. Hyde. 
Twentieth New York, Col. Ernest Von Vegesack. 
Thirty-third New York, Lieut. Col. Joseph W. Corning. 
Forty-ninth New York, Lieut. Col. William C. Alberger, Maj. 

George W. Johnson. 
Seventy-seventh New York, Capt. Nathan S. Babcock. 

ARTILLERY. 
Capt. Romyn B. Ayres. 

Maryland Light, Battery B, Lieut. Theidore J. Vanneman. 
New York Light, First Battery, Capt. Andrew Cowan. 
Fifth U. S., Battery F, Lieut. Leonard Martin. 

NINTH ARMY CORPS. 

Maj. Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside. 
Maj. Gen. Jesse L. Reno. 
Brig. Gen. Jacob D. Cox. 

Escort. 
First Maine Cavalry, Company G, Capt. Zebulon B. Blethen. 

FIRST DIVISION. 
Brig. Gen. Orlando B. Wilcox. 

First Brigade. 
Col. Benjamin C. Christ. 

Twenty-eighth Massachusetts, Capt. Andrew P. Caraher. 
Seventeenth Michigan, Col. William Withington. 
Seventy-ninth New York, Lieut. Col. David Morrison. 
Thirtieth Pennsylvania, Maj. Edward Overton, Capt. William 
H. Diehl. 



74 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Second Brigade. 
Col. Thomas Welsh. 

Eighth Michigan, Lieut. Col. Frank Graves, Maj. Ralph Ely. 
Forty-sixth New York, Lieut. Col. Joseph Gerhardt. 
Forty-fifth Pennsylvania, Lieut. Col. John L. Curtin. 
One Hundredth Pennsylvania, Lieut. Col. David A. Beckey. 

ARTILLERY. 
Massachusetts Light, Eighth Battery, Capt. Asa M. Cook. 
Second U. S., Battery E, Lieut. Samuel N. Benjamin. 

SECOND DIVISION. 
Brig. Gen. Samuee D. Sturgis. 

First Brigade. 
Brig. Gen. James Nagle. 

Second Maryland, Lieut. Col. J. Eugene Duryea. 
Sixth New Hampshire, Col. Simon G. Griffin. 
Ninth New Hampshire, Col. Enoch Q. Fellows. 
Forty-eighth Pennsylvania, Lieut. Col. Joshua K. Sigfried. 

Second Brigade. 
Brig. Gen. Edward Ferrero. 

Twenty-first Massachusetts, Col. William S. Clark. 

Thirty-fifth Massachusetts, Col. Edward A. Wild, Lieut. Col. 

Sumner Carruth. 
Fifty-first New York, Col. Robert B, Potter. 
Fifty-first Pennsylvania, Col. John F. Hartranft. 

ARTILLERY. 
Pennsylvania Light, Battery D, Capt. George W. Durell. 
Fourth U. S., Battery E, Capt. Joseph C. Clark, Jr. 

THIRD DIVISION. 
Brig. Gen. Isaac D. Rodman. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 75 

First Brigade. 
Col. Harrison S. Fairchild. 

Ninth New York, Lieut. Col. Edgar A. Kimball. 
Eighty-ninth New York, Maj. Edward Jardine. 
One Hundred Third New York, Maj. Benjamin Ringold. 

Second Brigade. 
Col. Edward Harland. 

Eighth Connecticut, Lieut. Col. Hiram Appleman, Maj. John E. 

Ward. 
Eleventh Connecticut, Col. Henry W. Kingsbury. 
Sixteenth Connecticut, Col. French Beach. 
Fourth Rhode Island, Col. William H. P. Stero, Lieut. Col. Joseph 

B. Curtis. 

ARTILLERY. 
Fifth U. S., Battery A, Lieut. Charles P. Muhlenberg. 

KANAWHA DIVISION. 

(1) Brig. Gen. Jacob D. Cox. 

(2) Col. Eliakim P. Scammon. 

First Brigade. 

(1) Col. Eliakim P. Scammon. 

(2) Col. Hugh Ewing. 

Twelfth Ohio, Col. Carr B. White. 

Twenty-third Ohio, Lieut. Col. Rutherford B. Hayes, Maj. James 

M. Comley. 
Thirtieth Ohio, Col. Hugh Ewing, Lieut. Col. Theodore Jones, 

Maj. George H. Hildt. 
Ohio Light Artillery, First Battery, Capt. James R. McMullen. 
Gilmore's Company, West Virginia Cavalry, Lieut. James 

Abraham. 
Harrison's Company, West Virginia Cavalry, Lieut. Dennis De- 

laney. 



76 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Second Brigade. 
Col. George Crook. 

Eleventh Ohio, Lieut. Col. Augustus H. Coleman, Maj. Lyman 

J. Jackson. 
Twenty-eighth Ohio, Lieut. Col. Gottfried Becker. 
Thirty-sixth Ohio, Lieut. Col. Melvin Clark. 
Schambeck's Company, Chicago Dragoons, Capt. Fredrick Scham- 

beck. 
Kentucky Light Artillery, Simmonds' Battery, Capt. Seth J. Sim- 

monds. 

UNATTACHED. 

Sixth New York Cavalry (Eight Companies), Col. Thomas C. 

Devin. 
Ohio Cavalry, Third Independent Company, Lieut. Jonas Seaman. 
Third U. S. Artillery, Batteries L and M, Capt. John Edwards, Jr. 



TWELFTH ARMY CORPS. 

(1) Maj. Gen. Joseph K. F. Mansfield. 

(2) Brig. Gen. Aepheus S. Williams. 

Escort. 
First Michigan Cavalry, Company L, Capt. Melvin Brewer. 

FIRST DIVISION. 

(1) Brig. Gen. Alpheus S. Williams. 

(2) Brig. Gen. Samuel S. Crawford. 

(3) Brig. Gen. George H. Gordon. 

First Brigade. 

(1) Brig. Gen. Samuel W. Crawford. 

(2) Col. Joseph F. Knipe. 

Fifth Connecticut, Capt. Henry W. Daboll. 

Tenth Maine, Col. George L. Beal. 

Twenty-eighth New York, Capt. William H. H. Mapes. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 77 

Forty-sixth Pennsylvania, Col. Joseph F. Knipe, Lieut. Col. James 
L. Selfridge. 

One Hundred Twenty-fourth Pennsylvania, Col. Joseph W. Haw- 
ley, Maj. Isaac L. Haldeman. 

One Hundred Twenty-fifth Pennsylvania, Col. Samuel Croas- 
dale, Lieut. Col. William W. Hammersley, Maj. Joel B. 
Wanner. 

Second Brigade. 

(1) Brig. Gen. George H. Gordon. 

(2) Col. Thomas H. Ruger. 
Twenty-seventh Indiana, Col. Silas Colgrove. 
Second Massachusetts, Col. George L. Andrews. 
Thirteenth New Jersey, Col. Ezra A. Carman. 

One Hundred Seventh New York, Col. R. B. Van Valkenburg. 
Zouaves d'Afrique, Pennsylvania. 
Third Wisconsin, Col. Thomas H. Ruger. 

SECOND DIVISION. 
Brig. Gen. George S. Greene. 

First Brigade. 

(1) Lieut. Col. Hector TyndalE. 

(2) Maj. Orrin J. Crane. 
Third Ohio, Maj. John Collins. 

Seventh Ohio, Maj. Orrin Crane, Capt. Fredrick A. Seymore. 
Twenty-ninth Ohio, Lieut. Theron S. Winship. 
Sixty-sixth Ohio, Lieut. Col. Eugene Powell. 
Twenty-eighth Pennsylvania, Maj. Arle Pardee, Jr. 

Second Brigade. 
Col. Henry J. Stainrook. 
Third Maryland, Lieut. Col. Joseph M. Sudsburg. 
One Hundred Second New York, Col. James C. Lane. 
One Hundred Ninth Pennsylvania, Capt George E. Seymour. 
One Hundred Eleventh Pennsylvania, Maj. Thomas M. Walker. 



78 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Third Brigade. 

(1) Col. William B. Goodrich. 

(2) Lieut. Col. Jonathan Austin. 
Third Delaware, Maj. Arthur Maginnis. 

Purnell Legion, Maryland, Lieut. Col. Benjamin L. Simpson. 
Sixtieth New York, Lieut. Col. Charles R. Brundage. 
Seventy-eighth New York, Lieut. Col. Jonathan Austin, Capt. 
Henry R. Stagg. 

ARTILLERY. 

Maine Light, Fourth Battery, Capt. O'Niel W. Robinson. 
Maine Light, Sixth Battery, Capt. Freeman McGilvery. 
First New York Light, Battery M, Capt. George W. Cothran. 
Pennsylvania Light, Battery E, Capt. Joseph M. Knap. 
Pennsylvania Light, Battery F, Capt. Robert B. Hampton. 
Fourth U. S., Battery F, Lieut. Edward D. Muhlenberg. 

CAVALRY DIVISION. 

Brig. Gen. Alfred Pleasanton. 

First Brigade. 

Maj. Charles J. Whiting. 

Fifth U. S., Capt. Joseph H. McArthur. 
Sixth U. S., Capt. William P. Sanders. 

Second Brigade. 

Col. John F. Farnesworth. 

Eighth Illinois, Maj. William H. Medill. 
Third Indiana, Lieut. Col. Jacob S. Buchanan. 
First Massachusetts, Capt. Casper Crownnshield. 
Eighth Pennsylvania, Capt. Peter Keenan. 

Third Brigade. 

Col. Richard H. Rush. 

Fourth Pennsylvania, Col. James H. Childs, Lieut. Col. James K. 

Kerr. 
Sixth Pennsylvania, Lieut. Col. C. Ross Smith. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 79 

Fourth Brigade. 
Col. Andrew T. McReynolds. 
First New York, Maj. Alonzo W. Adams. 
Twelfth Pennsylvania, Maj. James A. Congdon. 

Fifth Brigade. 
Col. Benjamin F. Davis. 
Eighth New York, Col. Benjamin F. Davis. 
Third Pennsylvania, Lieut. Col. Samuel W. Owen. 

ARTILLERY. 
Second U. S., Battery A, Capt. John A. Tidball. 
Second U. S., Batteries B and L, Capt. James M. Robertson. 
Second U. S., Battery M, Lieut. Peter C. Hains. 
Third U. S., Batteries C and G, Capt. Horatio G. Gibson. 

UNATTACHED. 

Fifteenth Pennsylvania Cavalry (detachment), Col. William J. 
Palmer. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 



CHAPTER V. 



Histories of the Regiments Participat- 
ing in the Battle of Antietam. 



Section Seven of the Act of the Assembly creating this Com- 
mission, contemplates a history of each of the Indiana Regiments 
that participated in the battle of Antietam, and in compliance 
with that provision of the law, we have summarized, from the 
records preserved by the United States, and other accessible reli- 
able data, the work of these five regiments during their connec- 
tion with the army in the Civil War. 

Officers of the Seventh, Fourteenth, and Twenty-seventh, by 
their reports prepared while those regiments were in the field, and 
when occurring events were fresh in the minds of all, have made 
it an easier task, in the compilation of these histories, but where 
there was a failure to do this, reliable data could only be gleaned 
from the official records, as it dropped out in the reports of other 
commanders, interested in narrating what their commands had 
done, and could not tell about themselves, without involving the 
Indiana regiments, whose officers seemed to have overlooked this 
important work. 

There are a number of survivors of the five regiments that 
served at the battle of Antietam, and who continued with their 
respective regiments to the close of the service, and most of these 
men have a vivid recollection of events as they occurred under 




COLONEL IRA GROVER 
Seventh Indiana Volunteers 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 81 

their several observations, but, as is well known, it hardly ever 
happens that any two men, after long years, remember the same 
thing alike. Hence, the importance of adhering to the record, as 
it was made at the time, so far as such record is accessible. 

In the order in which they appear on the roster of Indiana 
soldiers, we give the respective histories of the different regi- 
ments, to whose memory Indiana erects this monument. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 



CHAPTER VI. 



The Seventh Indiana Volunteer Infantry. 

Indiana had five regiments in the Mexican War. In the Civil 
War her first numbered regiment was the Sixth Infantry. The 
Seventh Infantry was one of the six regiments accepted by the 
United States on the first call of the President for 75,000 volun- 
teers, for three months' service. 

It was mustered into the service on the 25th day of April, 
1861, with Ebenezer Dumont, a Mexican War veteran, as 
Colonel ; Benjamin J. Spooner, Lieutenant Colonel ; Samuel P. 
Oyler, Major; James Gavin, Adjutant; David E. Sparks, Quar- 
termaster, and George W. New, as Surgeon. 

On the 29th of May, 1861, the regiment was ordered to West 
Virginia, and went at once by rail to Grafton, and on the 2d day 
of June proceeded to Webster, where it was joined by other regi- 
ments. The entire force was divided into two columns under 
command of Colonel Kelley, and marched to Philipi, the Seventh 
being in advance. The Seventh, as the advance, drove in the 
enemy's pickets when within a mile of Philipi, and following up, 
drove the enemy out of town and two miles beyond. It skirmished 
at times with the enemy for six weeks. On the 12th day of July 
the enemy fell back, followed by the Union troops, to St. George's, 
Cheat river being forded on the way. At Garrick's Ford, the 
enemy under General Garnetts made a stand, and the Seventh 
Indiana charged down the bank of the river, crossed over, and 
after capturing the enemy's baggage, continued the pursuit, and 
after a short sharp engagement routed the enemy who fled, leaving 
General Garnett dead on the field. Soon after this affair, the term 
of enlistment expired and the regiment was ordered home for 
muster out service. The call for three years men had been made 




MAJOR MERIT C. WELCH, Seventh Indiana Volunteers 

Who Commanded Seventh Indiana Regiment in Wilderness 
Campaign 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 83 

while the regiment was serving its short term, and on the way 
home, at the suggestion of Colonel Dumont, it was decided to re- 
organize the regiment as soon as mustered out, and with some 
changes in officers and men the regiment was reorganized and 
mustered into the service for three years on the 15th of Septem- 
ber, 1861. The officers of the reorganized regiment were Eben- 
ezer Dumont, Colonel; James Gavin, Lieutenant Colonel; John 
F. Cheek, Major; John M. Blair, Adjutant; Richard P. Johnson, 
Quartermaster; John Keiger, Chaplain, and George W. New, 
Surgeon. As credited to the different counties, Companies A and 
K were raised in Dearborn County, Companies B and H in Hen- 
dricks County, Company C in Ohio County, Companies D, G and 
E in Decatur County, Company F in Johnson County, Company I 
in Marion County. 

Immediately after muster in as reorganized, the regiment was 
again ordered to the seat of war in West Virginia, and joined Gen. 
Joseph J. Reynolds' command at Cheat Mountain. On the date 
of the regiment's muster in to the three years' service Colonel 
Dumont was promoted to Brigadier General of Volunteers, and 
on the 3d of November Lieutenant Colonel Gavin was promoted 
to Colonel. On the 3d of October, 1861, the regiment participated 
in the battle of Green Briar, with the forces under General 
Reynolds. This was the regiment's first engagement, but it suf- 
fered little loss. 

The regiment passed a good part of the winter in the Elk- 
water country of West Virginia, and its casualties while there in 
sickness and death were very severe. It left Webster one thou- 
sand men strong, and when it returned there, about the 7th of 
December, but six hundred men were reported for duty. 
Eighteen men died at Elkwater and Beverly and forty-one had 
died in hospitals at Wheeling, Grafton and Cumberland, and 
many were in different hospitals unable to march. Most of the 
month of December, 1861, and January, 1862, the regiment per- 
formed duty along the line of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad 
between Cumberland, Maryland, and Paw Paw Tunnel, West 



84 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Virginia, the division to which it belonged then being under Gen- 
eral Lander, until that officer died, when General James Shields 
assumed command of the division. 

Under General Shields the division moved forward into the 
Shenandoah Valley and went into camp north of Winchester, 
the Seventh Indiana at this time being a part of the Third Bri- 
gade of Shield's Division, commanded by Colonel Erastus B. 
Tyler, of the Seventh Ohio Infantry. 

General Shield's picket line was driven in on the afternoon 
of March 22, by General Ashby with a force of cavalry and 
artillery, and following that attack Shield's Division formed in 
line of battle for the bloody engagement which occurred the next 
day between the village of Kernstown and Winchester, and which 
is known as the battle of Winchester. 

The Seventh Indiana in this engagement was commanded 
by Lieutenant Colonel John F. Cheek, who had been promoted 
to that position from the rank of Major. The Seventh Indiana 
formed the right wing of Tyler's Brigade in this engagement, 
and, according to the official report of its brigade commander, 
fought like a veteran regiment and made a splendid record in 
this, its initial battle of the war. Its loss as officially reported 
was 7 men killed, and 2 officers and 31 men wounded, and 9 
missing, making a total of 49. After this engagement the enemy 
fell back and Shield's Division followed as far as Staunton, 
reaching there about the 1st of May. From there the division 
faced about and marched to Front Royal, reaching there the 
10th of May, and from there to Fredericksburg, which it reached 
the 20th of May. 

The division had scarcely settled down in camp at Fredericks- 
burg when word came that Stonewall Jackson had again invaded 
the Shenandoah Valley and the division made a hurried march 
to Front Royal, reaching there the 30th of May. From there the 
division marched to Conrad's Store, a few miles above Luray, 
and went into camp. On the evening of June 7th Tyler's and 
Carroll's Brigades of Shield's Division were ordered to make 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 85 

quick time to Port Republic, a distance of twelve miles. The 
Seventh Indiana at this time numbered about 500 men fit for 
duty, active campaigning and hard marching having reduced the 
regiment to this number. 

It was now commanded by Colonel James Gavin, and as a 
part of Tyler's Brigade, which, with Carroll's Brigade, com- 
prising a force of about 3,000 men, on the 8th and 9th of June, 
1862, met the enemy, 8,000 strong, under Stonewall Jackson, at 
Port Republic. The two brigades made a desperate stand for 
four hours, holding in check a desperate enemy of three times 
their number, but the Union troops were finally compelled to 
fall back in retreat before overwhelming numbers. The Seventh 
Indiana bore a conspicuous part in this bloody engagement, and 
its loss was the heaviest it had yet suffered in any action. Its 
loss was one officer and 8 men killed, 4 officers and 103 men 
wounded and one officer and 28 men missing, making a total of 
145. In this engagement Captain Solomon Waterman, of Com- 
pany C, was killed, Colonel Gavin and Major Patterson, of the 
Seventh Indiana, both had their horses killed under them in this 
action. 

From Port Republic the Seventh Indiana with its brigade was 
sent to Alexandria for rest and recuperation, where it remained 
until the last of July, 1862, when the brigade under Colonel S. S. 
Carroll numbered the fourth of General James B. Rickett's Sec- 
ond Division of General Irvin McDowell's Third Army Corps, 
moved by way of Manassas, Warrenton and White Sulphur 
Springs to Culpepper Court House, arriving there on the 7th of 
August. 

According to the report of Col. S. S. Carroll, commanding 
the Fourth Brigade to which the Seventh Indiana was attached, 
the brigade went into action between 9 and 10 p. m. at Cedar 
Mountain on the evening of August 9th, being in line on the left 
of the division of artillery. The position was barely taken and 
skirmishers thrown into the woods in front when the enemy 
opened with a battery on our left about fifty yards distant, 



86 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

throwing grape and canister into that flank, accompanied with 
musketry firing. The two regiments on the left flank returned 
the fire and fell back under cover of a fence running perpendicular 
to the line of batttle. 

The Seventh Indiana was one of the two regiments referred 
to as occupying his left by Colonel Carroll in his report, and in 
the brief time the regiment was under fire its loss was 2 officers 
and 41 men wounded, making a total of 43. 

The Fourth Brigade of Rickett's Division was commanded by 
Colonel Joseph Thoburn, of the First West Virginia Volunteers, 
after the battle of Cedar Mountain, when, on the 17th of August. 
the division retired from that locality, and where it had remained 
since the battle. 

From the 17th to the 30th of August the Seventh Indiana was 
occupied with hard marching and countermarching, but it was 
not called upon to meet the enemy until the 30th, when its brigade 
was sent to the relief of General Kearney near Groveton. In 
this affair the Seventh Indiana suffered a loss of one officer and 
15 men wounded, Colonel Gavin, who commanded the regiment, 
being the officer severely wounded and disabled for further 
service for some months. In this engagement Colonel Thoburn, 
who commanded the brigade, was also wounded, and General 
Ricketts, in his report as division commander, says that no report 
of casualties had been received from the Fourth Brigade. And 
this is not wonderful, if we reflect that right here was the chaos 
preceding the going to pieces of a great army under a misfit com- 
mander. With all of Pope's defeated army, the Seventh Indiana 
fell back behind the defenses of Washington, and in the reor- 
ganization of the Army of the Potomac the regiment was 
assigned to the Second Brigade, First Division, First Army 
Corps, commanded by Major General Joseph Hooker. Ira 
Grover, who had been captain of Company E, was made Major of 
the regiment on the 1st of July, 1862, and was now in command 
of the regiment, which was brigaded with the Seventy-sixth and 
Ninety-fifth New York and Fifty-sixth Pennsylvania regiments. 




MAJOR MERIT C. WELCH 

Seventh Indiana Volunteers— at 85. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 87 

The Seventh, with its brigade as now constituted, marched with 
its corps northward through Maryland to South Mountain, where, 
on the 14th of September, it was engaged in the battle at that 
place, and in which its loss was 12 men wounded. In this en- 
gagement the brigade was commanded by General Doubleday, 
until the division commander, General John P. Hatch, was 
wounded, when Colonel Wainwright assumed command of the 
brigade, and, after he was wounded, the command of the brigade 
devolved upon Lieutenant-Colonel Hoffman, of the Fifty-sixth 
Pennsylvania. Under the command of this last-named officer the 
brigade went into the battle of Antietam on the 17th of Septem- 
ber, 1862. The Seventh was under fire but a short time at Antie- 
tam and its loss was slight, being one officer and three men 
wounded. 

On the last of October, 1862, the Army of the Potomac re- 
crossed the Potomac river, Pleasanton's Cavalry leading the 
advance. Lee's army was slowly falling back, its rear covered 
by Stewart's Cavalry; and from the time the river had been 
crossed there was almost daily clashes between the Union and 
Confederate cavalry. At Union Pleasanton ran up against in- 
fantry, as well as cavalry, and he called for the assistance of in- 
fantry, and the call was scarcely sent back until the Seventh 
Indiana was on the ground. The regiment unslung knapsacks, 
went in with a rush, and in a very short time had the rebel in- 
fantry that had hindered Pleasanton's progress on the move. In 
this affair the regiment suffered a loss of 4 men killed and 6 
wounded, among the former being the color bearer of the regi- 
ment. 

The rebel army went into camp for the winter on the south 
bank of the Rappahannock, and was confronted by the Army of 
the Potomac, camping on the north bank around Falmouth. 

The Seventh Indiana participated in the battle of Fredericks- 
burg from the 11th to the 15th of December, inclusive, and was 
commanded by Lieutenant Colonel John F. Cheek, Colonel James 
Gavin, being in comand of the Second Brigade of Doubleday's 



88 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Division. Although under fire much of the time during 
the progress of this great battle, the loss of the regiment was 
slight, being one officer and 5 men wounded. 

After this engagement the regiment returned to its camp near 
Belle Plains, where it remained until ordered to move to Chan- 
cellorsville. During this interim Colonel Gavin, on the 22d of 
April, 1863, resigned command of the regiment, and Lieutenant 
Colonel Cheek, having resigned on the 15th of March 1863, Major 
Ira Grover was made Lieutant Colonel March 12, 1863. On the 
same date Major William C. Banta was made Lieutenant Colonel 
and Captain Merit C. Welch, of Company D, was promoted to 
Major. The officers mustered in at these dates remained with the 
regiment until the close of its service. 

The Seventh Indiana participated in the battle of Chancellors- 
ville from the 1st to the 6th of May, 1863, under command of 
Lieutenant and Colonel Ira G. Grover, the regiment forming part 
of the Second Brigade, Brig. Gen. Lysander Cutler ; First Division, 
General James S. Wadsworth; First Army Corps, Major Gen- 
eral John F. Reynolds. The regiment was in line of battle dur- 
ing all of this engagement, but suffered no loss. It marched with 
its brigade to Gettysburg and was under fire there parts of the 
1st, 2d and 3d of July, and its loss was 2 men killed and 5 
wounded. It was under the same commanders as at Chancellors- 
ville. 

The regiment moved with its brigade division and corps from 
Gettysburg and returned to Virginia, doing picket duty along the 
Rappahannock and the Orange and Alexandria railroad through 
the months of August, September and part of October, and finally 
came to Culpepper Court House and from there to Mine Run 
with all the army, and had some part in the affair which history 
records as somewhat of a military fiasco. 

Little or nothing for the country was accomplished, but some 
brave men died from the 26th of November to the 2d of De- 
cember, when it was decided that the Army of the Potomac should 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 89 

fall back behind the Rapidan and go into winter quarters on the 
north side of the river. 

In the reorganization of the Army of the Potomac, as it moved 
out from winter quarters on the 4th of May, 1864, for the Wilder- 
ness campaign, the Seventh Indiana was assigned to the First 
Brigade, General Lysander Cutler; Fourth Division, Brigadier 
General Wadsworth; Fifth Corps, Major General G. K. Warren. 
The regiments of the brigade were, besides the Seventh Indiana, 
the Nineteenth Indiana Volunteers, Twenty-fourth Michigan Vol- 
unteers, First Battalion New York Sharpshooters and the Second, 
Sixth and Seventh Wisconsin Volunteers. The brigade had been 
known as the "Iron Brigade," since it had been given that name 
at the battle of South Mountain. 

The brigade crossed the Rapidan on the evening of May 4, 
1864, at Germania Ford, and went into camp near Wilderness 
Tavern. 

The Seventh Indiana was commanded by Colonel Ira G. 
Grover, and the next officer in rank present was Major Merit C. 
Welch, the Lieutenant Colonel, William C. Banta, being absent. 

On the morning of May 5 the Seventh Indiana moved for- 
ward, attacked the enemy in its front, and under the impression 
that a charge by the whole brigade had been ordered, as the right 
of its brigade, the Seventh Indiana charged the enemy in its 
front and captured the Fiftieth Virginia with its colors and 200 
prisoners, including its colonel. But when it had accomplished 
this it found it was far in advance of the line of battle of its 
brigade, and flanked by the enemy on either side ; and all it could 
do was to retreat under an enfilading fire of the enemy. And 
while it had captured a colonel of the enemy and most of his regi- 
ment, it lost its own Colonel Grover, by capture, and 50 men. 

Major Welch, the ranking officer, assumed command, and the 
regiment, with its brigade and division, was ordered to the left 
to the support of the Second Corps, where it was again engaged 
on the morning of the 6th, and was charged in front and right 
flank. The loss in this battle was one officer, Captain George P. 



90 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Clayton, Company E; 15 men killed; 3 officers and 80 men 
wounded, and four officers and 50 men missing, including Colonel 
Ira G. Grover, according to the report of Major Welch, prepared 
on the 7th of August, 1864. (Part 1, Vol. 36, Official Records 
War of the Rebellion.) 

Among the wounded officers in this battle was Captain B. F. 
Abrams, of Company I, and Lieutenant Robert M. Curtis, of 
Company H. Lieutenant J. V. Hadley, of Company B, and Lieu- 
tenant Homer Chisman, of Company K, were both captured in 
this engagement while serving on the staff of General Cutler, 
who commanded the brigade. The Seventh was withdrawn until 
the evening of the 7th, when it again marched with its division 
all night and attacked the enemy near Spottsylvania Court House 
about 8 a. m. on the morning of the 8th, the brigade being the 
extreme right of the Fifth Corps. The brigade was attacked by 
the enemy in force in front and right flank, and swung back to a 
commanding position, threw up rifle pits, which it held until the 
morning of the 10th, when it charged the enemy's works in its 
front, but was repulsed. The same day another charge was 
ordered, and the brigade was again repulsed, and fell back into 
its works, where it lay until the evening of the 12th. At that 
time the brigade was ordered to the left of the division, and it 
again assaulted the enemy's works, gaining a position within 30 
yards of the enemy's works, where it kept up a continuous fire 
for five hours, silencing the enemy. The loss in this affair was 
1 officer, Captain Hugh Jamison, Company C, and 7 men killed, 
and 3 officers and 39 men wounded, and 1 missing. 

In this action the Seventh Indiana expended 140 rounds of 

ammunition to the man. From its last position the regiment, with 
its brigade, moved three miles toward North Anna, and threw 
up rifle pits. 

On the evening of May 23 the brigade crossed the North Anna 
river at Jerico Ford, the Seventh Indiana being on the extreme 
right ; but before the brigade got into position it was attacked by 
the enemy in overwhelming numbers and forced to retire 200 



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INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 91 

yards, but repulsed the attacking enemy with great slaughter. On 
the evening of May 25, after marching two miles to the left, the 
Seventh Indiana was detailed by General Cutler to drive the 
rebel skirmishers from a dense piece of woods in its front. It 
had a severe skirmish with the enemy, driving him within his 
works. 

The loss to the regiment in this affair was 1 officer, Lieutenant 
David B. Gageby, Company G, and 7 men killed, and 1 officer 
and 24 men wounded, and 4 men missing. 

The Seventh Indiana, with its brigade, crossed the Pamunky 
river, near Hanovertown, on the 28th of May, threw up works, 
and on the 30th had a skirmish with the enemy near Bethseda 
church. It lay here until the 6th of June, skirmishing with the 
enemy every day. The loss of the regiment in this epoch was 3 
men killed, and 1 officer and 18 men wounded. 

General Wadsworth, commanding the division, was killed on 
the 6th of May; and General Cutler, of the "Iron Brigade," as- 
sumed command of the division, and Colonel E. S. Bragg, of the 
Sixth Wisconsin Volunteers, assumed command of the brigade. 
On the 13th of June the division crossed the Chickahominy river, 
at Long Bridge, and marched to the Charles City court house, re- 
maining there until the 16th; then crossed the James river at 
Wilcox's Landing, marching to within three miles of Petersburg. 
On the morning of the 17th the brigade moved into line of battle 
on the left of the Ninth Army Corps, and threw up rifle pits in 
close proximity to the enemy's works, in front of Petersburg. 

On the morning of the 18th of June the Seventh Indiana, with 
less than 100 men, took part in the charge on the enemy's works. 
Its loss in that charge was 1 officer, Captain Orville D. Williams, 
Company C, and 2 men killed, and 2 officers and 28 men wounded. 
A large detachment of the Seventh was on picket at the time of 
the assault. Cutler's division threw up breastworks within 300 
yards of the enemy's works, which it occupied until the evening of 
the 30th of July. Lieutenant David Holmes, of Company F, of 
the Seventh, was also killed before Petersburg. The loss of the 



92 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Seventh before Petersburg was 2 officers and 10 men killed, and 
2 officers and 55 men wounded, and 1 man missing. 

The Seventh Indiana remained and participated in the siege 
of Petersburg until the 18th of August, when it moved with that 
portion of the army selected to cut the Weldon and South Side 
railroad; and it took part in the battle near Yellow Tavern on 
the 19th of August, 1864. 

In that engagement a detachment of the Seventh Indiana, 
numbering 74 men on the skirmish line, and commanded by Cap- 
tain Jesse Armstrong, of Company K, of the Seventh, was cap- 
tured entire, when the line of the brigade, under General E. S. 
Bragg, was attacked in force by the enemy. In this engagement 
the loss of the Seventh Indiana was 1 man killed and 3 wounded, 
and 2 officers and 74 men missing; in all 80 men. 

This was the last service of the Seventh Indiana, as organized 
for the three years' service. Its term of service expired on the 
6th of September, 1864, and the men entitled to discharge were 
sent home. 

One hundred and seven men, veterans and recruits, were held 
and temporarily assigned to the Nineteenth Indiana Volunteers ; 
and on the 18th of October, 1864, this new organization was con- 
solidated with the Twentieth Indiana Volunteers, and thus two 
splendid Indiana regiments that had fought side by side in the 
old "Iron Brigade" until there was little of them left, ceased to 
exist, save in memory. 

In the three months' service there were 782 men connected 
with the Seventh Indiana Volunteers ; and in the three years' 
service there were 1,299 men connected with it. 

Eleven commissioned officers and 201 non-commissioned offi- 
cers and men died. Eight commissioned officers and 108 non- 
commissioned officers and men were killed in action. Nineteen 
officers and 349 non-commissioned officers and men were wounded 
in action. 

The regiment leaves behind it a record of which every living 
member of it, and every citizen of Indiana, is proud; and we 
think justly. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 93 

Major Merit C. Welch, who served with the regiment for 
three years, and commanded it through the bloody campaigns of 
the Wilderness and came home with it at the expiration of its 
term of service, was not content to remain there; but on the 9th 
of March, 1865, led the 146th Indiana Volunteers, a new regi- 
ment, to the field, and was mustered out with that regiment at the 
close of its term of service, and still lives at 85, honored and 
loved by all who love and honor the man who did so much for his 
country. We are glad to furnish with this report portraits of 
him as he was when a soldier, and as he is in his honored old age. 



94 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 



CHAPTER VII. 



The Fourteenth Indiana Volunteers. 

On the President's first call for 75,000 volunteers, but five regi- 
ments were accepted from Indiana by the government. Under 
an act of the General Assembly of the State, six additional regi- 
ments were provided for, to serve one year. Under this act the 
Fourteenth Indiana Volunteers was organized and went into 
camp at Camp Vigo, Terre Haute, Ind. 

The companies of the regiment were recruited as follows: 
Company A in Parke County ; Companies B and G in Knox Coun- 
ty ; Company C in Martin County ; Company D in Greene County ; 
Company E in Vanderburg County ; Company F in Vigo County ; 
Company H in Owen County ; Company I in Vermillion County, 
and Company K in Monroe County. 

The regiment was organized for one year's service in May, 
1861. A few days later the President issued his call for three 
years' volunteers and the Fourteenth Indiana almost unanimously 
answered that call and were mustered into the United States 
service for three years on the 7th of June, 1861. 

Nathan Kimball, a physician of Loogootee, who had organized 
Company C, was commissioned and mustered Colonel of the regi- 
ment. He had graduated from Asbury University and was a 
captain of one of the companies of the Second Indiana Volun- 
teers in the Mexican War, and had distinguished himself at Buena 
Vista. 

John R. Mahan, of Putnam County, was commissioned Lieu- 
tenant Colonel ; William Harrow, of Knox County, Major ; John 
J. P. Blinn, of Vigo County, Adjutant; Touissaint C. Buntin, of 
Vigo County, Quartermaster; Thomas E. Webb, Chaplain, and 
Joseph G. McPheeters, of Monroe County, Surgeon. 




MAJOR GENERAL NATHAN KIMBALL 
First Colonel Fourteenth Indiana Volunteers 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 95 

After its organization, the regiment went from Terre Haute 
to Indianapolis, remained there until the 5th day of July, when 
it went by rail to the seat of war in Western Virginia, crossing 
the Ohio at Bellaire. It arrived at Grafton on the 7th and went to 
Rich Mountain by way of Buchanan, and arrived at Middle Fork 
on the 10th of July. The regiment was present but not engaged 
in the battle of Rich Mountain. 

After this battle the regiment engaged in frequent skirmishes 
with the enemy, and on the 14th day of August lost its first man 
killed in action, William Wilkinson, of Company B. 

The enemy retreated from Rich Mountain pursued by the 
Union troops consisting, of the Fourteenth Indiana, Twenty- 
fourth and Twenty-fifth Ohio, Captain Bracken's Indiana Cav- 
alry and four pieces of artillery, all under the command of Colonel 
Kimball of the Fourteenth Indiana. 

While the command was encamped on Cheat Mountain sum- 
mit, the enemy in large force under General Robert E. Lee, sur- 
rounded it and attacked from all sides, but was repulsed in every 
direction, with a loss of about 100 killed and wounded. The com- 
piler of the government records concerning this engagement, says 
Colonel Kimball's report of casualties was never found, but there 
were several men of the Union forces killed and wounded, and 
among the killed was Lieutenant August Junod of Company E, 
Fourteenth Indiana. 

The first engagement in which the Fourteenth was under ar- 
tillery fire was at Greenbriar on the 3d of October, 1861. The 
Union forces here consisted of the Seventh, Ninth, Fourteenth, 
Fifteenth and Seventeenth Indiana, the Twenty-fourth, Twenty- 
fifth and Thirty-second Ohio, Third West Virginia, two batteries 
of artillery and one company of cavalry, all under command of 
General J. J. Reynolds, of Indiana. In this engagement the Four- 
teenth Indiana lost three men killed and four wounded. 

On the 6th of January, 1862, the brigade commanded by Col- 
onel Kimball marched to Blue Gap Pass, where it had a brief but 
spirited engagement with the enemy. 



96 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

While Colonel Kimball commanded a brigade, Lieutenant Col- 
onel Mahan was in command of the Fourteenth. Colonel Kimball 
was commissioned a Brigadier General on the 15th of April, 1862. 

On January 8th, 1862, General W. F. Lander assumed com- 
mand of the division to which the Fourteenth was attached, and 
ordered the troops to fall back upon the line of the Baltimore and 
Ohio railroad, and the regiment moved to North Branch bridge, 
on the Potomac, five miles above Cumberland. On January 20th 
Lieutenant Colonel Mahan of the regiment resigned and Major 
Harrow was appointed to the vacancy, and Captain Lucien Foote 
was made Major. January and February were occupied in clear- 
ing up the line of the railroad to Martinsburg. 

On the death of General Lander, General James Shields as- 
sumed command of the division. On March 18th we advanced 
through Winchester to Strasburg, and drove the enemy beyond 
Cedar Creek. Two of the regiment were wounded in this move- 
ment. 

On March 22d, while the greater part of Shield's Division 
lay in camp two miles north of Winchester, Colonel Ashby, with 
cavalry and artillery, made a furious attack on his outpost picket 
line and drove it in. 

This was the opening of the battle of Winchester, which was 
fought on March 23d. General Shields was wounded early in 
the engagement, and the command of the Union forces devolved 
upon General Kimball during the remainder of the engagement. 

The loss of the Fourteenth Indiana, which was commanded by 
Lieutenant Colonel Harrow, was 12 killed and 60 wounded. 
Among the wounded officers were Captain James R. Kelley and 
Lieutenant Paul E. Slocum, of Company K, Lieutenant John 
Lindsey of Company I, Captain John H. Martin and Lieutenant 
David E. Beem of Company H, and Sergeant Major Thomas C. 
Bailey. Captain Kelley died of his wounds at Winchester on the 
8th of May, 1862. 

On April 15th, Colonel Kimball was promoted to Brigadier 
General ; Lieutenant Colonel Harrow was made Colonel ; Captain 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 97 

Philander R. Owens of Company I was made Lieutenant Colonel ; 
Captain Martin of Company H was made Major, and Lieutenant 
David E. Beem of the latter Company was made its Captain. 
Surgeon Clippinger resigned and Assistant Surgeon Anson Hurd 
was promoted to the vacancy. 

On May 12th Shield's Division was detached from Bank's 
Corps, and sent to General McDowell at Fredricksburg. 

The division reached Fredricksburg on the 22d of May, and 
the next day received word that Banks had been driven out of the 
Shenandoah Valley by Jackson, and the division at once started 
on a forced return march to his assistance. It reached Front 
Royal on the 30th of May, and after a short brisk engagement 
with the enemy found at that point, captured 60 prisoners, and re- 
captured 232 of Banks' men who had been captured at Winches- 
ter, one piece of artillery and a number of horses, wagons and 
mules. The enemy fled, leaving their dead on the field. 

On the 8th of June General Kimball, who now commanded the 
first brigade of Shield's Division, learned that the third and fourth 
brigades of the division, commanded by General Tyler and Colonel 
Carroll, respectively, had met with overwhelming defeat at Port 
Republic, and hastened to their assistance, but met these badly 
worsted troops in hot retreat from that unfortunate battlefield. 

Major Martin of the Fourteenth Indiana resigned on the 20th 
of June. On the 21st of June, 1862, it left Front Royal for Alex- 
andria, and from there was sent to the Army of the Potomac by 
transports. On the 2d of July, Kimball's Brigade became attached 
to French's Third Division of Sumner's Corps, and continued 
with that Corps under its various commanders during the remain- 
der of its service. At this time Colonel Harrow and Lieutenant 
Colonel Owens had both resigned, leaving the Fourteenth Indiana 
without a field officer. Captain John Coons of Company G com- 
manded the regiment as senior officer. 

On the 16th of August the Fourteenth with its corps left Har- 
rison's Landing for Alexandria, arriving there on the 28th of Au- 
gust. The Second Corps crossed the Potomac and became a part 



98 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

of the reorganized Army of the Potomac, and moved northward 
through Maryland in the campaign that ended in the battle of An- 
tietam, September 17th. 

The Fourteenth Indiana, as part of Kimball's Brigade, of 
French's Third Division of Sumner's Second Corps, reached 
Keedysville on the 16th of September, 1862, and on the morning 
of the 17th crossed Antietam Creek, and as the right of Kimball's 
Brigade, went into action at 8 o'clock a. m., and for more than 
four long hours fought along "Bloody Lane" where the battle 
raged fiercest, holding its ground and earning from its division 
commander the title "Gibraltar Brigade," which it justly carried 
during the remainder of its service. 

The Fourteenth Indiana, in this engagement, was commanded 
by Colonel Harrow, its second Colonel, while the brigade was com- 
manded by its first Colonel, now General Kimball. Colonel Har- 
row's official report portrays the desperate fighting and terrible 
loss of this splendid regiment at the battle of Antietam, and we 
give it entire. 

Battlefield, near Sharpsburg, Md. 
September 19th, 1862. 
Sir: 

I report as follows: On the morning of the 17th instant, in 
obedience to your orders, my regiment moved forward on the 
right of the brigade, advancing rapidly towards the enemy, who 
were then engaging our line. We passed through an orchard, 
emerging in a plowed field, receiving during the execution of the 
movement, a rapid fire from the enemy ; this about 8 o'clock a. m. 
We ascended the hill in our front, and occupied the crest, from 
which position we engaged the enemy, sheltered under ditches, 
rocks and fences, with a large reserve force in a field of corn in 
their rear. The contest here continued for near four hours, dur- 
ing which time the enemy poured upon us a terrific and murder- 
ous fire from infantry, also grape shot and shell, thrown from a 
battery on our right and front. In our immediate front as many 
as eight stands of rebel colors were exhibited at a time. 




BRIGADIER GENERAL and COLONEL WILLIAM HARROW 
Fourteenth Indiana Volunteers, who Commanded Regiment 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 99 

My regiment went into the fight with sixty rounds of ammu- 
nition, and after firing the last one, the enemy were discovered 
moving in heavy force upon my right flank. At this moment my 
own regiment and the Eighth Ohio Volunteers, Colonel Lawyer 
commanding on my left, immediately changed their front and 
formed at right angles to our original line. The line thus formed 
was held and the enemy repulsed, our men using ammunition 
taken from the dead and wounded. After 12 m., the enemy re- 
tired and my regiment was not again engaged during the day, but 
lay upon their arms until night, under a hot fire of shot and shell 
from the enemy's batteries. 

My officers and men conducted themselves with courage and 
daring seldom equalled and never surpassed. I cannot mention 
one without naming all. We went into the fight with 320 men 
and lost in killed and wounded 181. A list of the name and 
rank of each is herewith furnished. My Adjutant J. J. P. Blinn, 
was with me during the day and conducted himself as only a brave 
man can, bearing messages for me, and when not engaged, re- 
maining at my side witnessing the heroic conduct of the regiment. 
General, our record is a proud one, but one which can never be 
thought of save with feelings of the most intense sorrow for the 
brave dead and wounded. 

Respectfully, 

Wm. Harrow, 
Colonel Commanding Fourteenth Indiana Volunteers. 

Gen. Kimball, Commanding 

First Brigade, French's Division, Sumner's Corps. 

The killed and mortally wounded in this engagement were 49 
men in the Fourteenth Indiana. Among the mortally wounded 
were Lieutenant Levins Bostwick of Company A, Lieutenant Ed- 
ward Ballinger of Company E, Lieutenant Porter B. Lundy of 
Company H. Among the wounded were Captain John Coons 
of Company G, Captain Elijah H. C. Cavins of Company D, 
Captain Robert F. Patterson of Company A, Captain William 
Houghton of Company C, Captain Granville B. Ward of Company 



100 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

K. Lieutenant Francis M. Kalley of Company A, Lieutenant Hor- 
ace Bradford of Company E, Sergeant W. D. Mull, afterwards 
Colonel of the One Hundred Forty-ninth Indiana Volunteers. 
Sergeant Jesse S. Carroll received five different wounds and was 
promoted to Lieutenant next day. Company A came out of the 
battle without an officer, and was commanded by Corporal Joshua 
L. Hays, who became Lieutenant and afterwards Captain of Com- 
pany A. 

On the 11th of August, 1862, Captain John Coons, of Com- 
pany G, had been commissioned Lieutenant Colonel ; and on the 
same date Captain Elijah H. C. Cavins, of Company D, had been 
commissioned major of the Fourteenth Indiana. 

On the 22d of September the regiment with its brigade forded 
the Potomac at Harper's Ferry, and went into camp on Bolivar 
Heights. From this camp, with its corps, it marched to Fal- 
mouth, opposite Fredericksburg, arriving on the 17th of Novem- 
ber. When called upon to go into the battle of Fredricksburg 
on the 10th of December, Colonel Harrow was absent sick, and 
the regiment was commanded by Major Cavins, Lieutenant 
Colonel Coons being still absent on account of his wounds re- 
ceived at Antietam. 

At Fredricksburg the Fourteenth Indiana, as a part of Kim- 
ball's Brigade, fought with the same desperate courage it had dis- 
played at Antietam and on other fields, and was one of the last 
regiments to leave the field and recross the Rappahannock on the 
16th of December, after the defeat of the Army of the Potomac 
had been fully realized. 

The regiment took into this battle 19 officers and 236 enlisted 
men, and lost in killed and wounded and missing, 10 officers and 
69 enlisted men. Captain Francis M. Kalley, of Company A, 
who had been severely wounded at Antietam, and had not fully 
recovered, insisted in going into this battle with his company, 
and fell mortally wounded. His first Lieutenant, J. W. Baker, 
lost a leg, but dragged himself from the field. Second Lieutenant 
J. H. L. Hays, of the same company, was also wounded. Lieu- 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 101 

tenant Charles H. Gibson, of Company C, was also mortally 
wounded. 

Among the wounded were: Captain William Houghton and 
Lieutenant Mathias Hattenbach, of Company C ; Captain Garland 
B. Shelleday, of Company F; Captain David E. Beem, of Company 
H, and Adjutant T. C. Bailey. General Kimball, first colonel of 
the regiment and commander of the brigade to which the Four- 
teenth Indiana was attached, was severely wounded; and by rea- 
son thereof retired from the Army of the Potomac, but was sub- 
sequently assigned to the command of a division in the Four- 
teenth Army Corps. 

On the 21st of January, 1863, Colonel Harrow resigned the 
command of the Fourteenth Indiana to accept promotion as 
brigadier general, and Lieutenant Colonel Coons was made 
colonel of the regiment; Major Elijah H. C. Cavins, lieutenant 
colonel, and Captain William Houghton, major. 

After the battle of Fredricksburg the Fourteenth Indiana 
returned to its camp near Falmouth, where it remained until the 
27th of April, when it marched with its brigade, division and 
corps to the United States ford on the Rappahannock. At that 
time the brigade was commanded by Colonel Samuel S. Carroll, 
of the Eighth Ohio. On the 1st of May it went into line of battle 
at Chancellorsville, and had its full part in that bloody conflict. 
It left the field on the 5th of May, falling back with all the army 
to the north side of the Rappahannock. It lost at Chancellors- 
ville 7 men killed and 50 wounded, and 7 missing. Six of the 
missing died of wounds. Among the wounded were Captain 
William Donaldson and Lieutenant John A. Staunis, of Company 
B ; Captain G. B. Shelleday, of Company F, Lieutenant Jesse S. 
Harrold, of Company H ; Captain G. B. Ward and Lieutenant 
Benjamin Smith, of Company K. 

At the battle of Chancellorsville the Second Corps was com- 
manded by Major General Darius N. Couch, who was relieved 
by Major General W. S. Hancock on the 11th of June, 1863. 

On the 15th of June the Fourteenth Indiana moved northward 



102 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

with its corps through Virginia and Maryland, crossing the Po- 
tomac at Edwards Ferry to the historic field of Gettysburg. 

It took its position in line of battle on the morning of July 2. 
and there fought with its old-time gallantry, losing 32 men killed 
and wounded. Here ten men of the regiment were killed or died 
of mortal wounds. Among the wounded were : Captain Joshua 
L. Hays, of Company A, who had fought his way up from cor- 
poral at Antietam to a captain at Gettysburg; Lieutentant John 
A. Stannis, of Company B ; Captain Samuel Nicholas and Lieu- 
tenant John C. Rogers, of Company C ; Captain John J. P. Blinn. 
former adjutant of the Fourteenth Indiana, was mortally wound- 
ed at Gettysburg while serving on the staff of Brigadier General 
Harrow, who commanded a division. 

The regiment with its brigade, division and corps left the 
battlefield of Gettysburg on the 5th of July, recrossed the Poto- 
mac on the 18th of July, and after skirmishing with the retreat- 
ing enemy at Bealton, Virginia, was sent from that point with 
other regiments of its corps to New York City to assist in quell- 
ing the draft riots which had broke out there. It returned to the 
Army of the Potomac on the 14th of September, 1863. General 
Hancock had been wounded at the battle of Gettysburg, and Gen- 
eral Warren now commanded the Second Corps. 

On the 10th of October General Lee began a flank movement 
around the Army of the Potomac by way of Madison Court 
House, endeavoring to place himself between that army and 
Washington. The Army of the Potomac fell back, and Lee's 
army advanced in the direction of Washington on its flank and 
rear. 

The cavalry of the two armies did the principal fighting; 
but on the 14th of October at Bristoe Station and Auburn, War- 
ren's Corps and Longstreet met in a conflict, in which the Four- 
teenth Indiana had a part, but suffered no serious loss. 

After this campaign the Army of the Potomac returned to its 
abandoned camps on the north bank of the Rapidan river, and 
remained there until the 26th of November, when it again moved 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 103 

forward, in what is known in history as the Mine Run campaign. 
For some days there was considerable skirmishing and artillery 
practice between the two great armies, but no general engage- 
ment. Still in this kind of fighting there was some loss to many 
different regiments. 

The Fourteenth Indiana suffered some loss here. Lieutenant 
George W. Rotrammel, of Company F, was killed in this kind of 
fighting, and Captain William Donaldson and Lieutenant A. S. 
Andrews, of Company B, and two enlisted men were wounded. 

The regiment with its brigade, division and corps returned to 
its camp north of the Rapidan, near Stevensburg, where it re- 
mained quietly until the 6th of February, 1864, when Carroll's 
Brigade, of which the Fourteenth Indiana was a part, crossed 
the Rapidan at Morton's Ford, and engaged the enemy on the 
south side of the river, where they were holding a strong position. 
After engaging the enemy for half a day, General Carroll's 
Brigade fell back to its camp north of the Rapidan. In this affair 
the Fourteenth Indiana lost 1 man killed and 13 wounded. Among 
the wounded were : Captain David E. Beem, of Company H, 
and Lieutenant Albert S. Andrews, of Company B. 

After the useless and ill-timed affair at Morton's Ford on the 
6th of February, 1864, the Fourteenth Indiana remained quietly 
in camp until the 3rd of May, when the Army of the Potomac, 
under command of General Grant and his lieutenant, General 
Meade, began its forward movement into the Wilderness. 

The Fourteenth Indiana at this time was part of Carroll's 
Brigade, Gibbon's Division, of the Second Corps, commanded by 
Major General Hancock. 

During the early part of this movement Colonel Coons, of the 
Fourteenth Indiana, was in command of a subdivision of Carroll's 
Brigade, and his regiment was commanded by Captain Nathan 
Willard, of Company E. 

At 4:30 p. m., on the 5th of May, Carroll's Brigade arrived 
at the intersection of the Brock road and the Orange Court House 
plank road, where a section of Ricketts' Battery had been cap- 



104 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

tured by the enemy and turned upon the Union lines. A detach- 
ment of the Eighth Ohio and Fourteenth Indiana, led by Captain 
Butterfield, of General Carroll's staff, recaptured the lost section 
and bivouacked at that point for the night, and at 5 a. m. on the 
morning of the 6th was in line for battle. The Seventh West Vir- 
ginia, Eighth Ohio and Fourteenth Indiana, under command of 
Colonel Coons, of the Fourteenth, were sent to the right of the 
plank road. From this point Carroll's Brigade drove Hill's Corps 
back a mile and a half, when suddenly it found itself confronted 
with Longstreet's Corps and flanked by that part of Hill's Corps 
that had not been driven back. From this position Carroll's 
Brigade withdrew with considerable loss in killed and wounded 
and prisoners, to the main line of battle and fortified. 

At 5 p. m., of the same day, Longstreet's Corps made a furious 
assault upon Hancock's line, planted their standards upon his 
breastworks and broke his line at one point, and drove back the 
Union troops. Carroll's Brigade was ordered to charge the enemy 
at this break in the line, and did- it with such desperate bravery 
and energy as to drive back the enemy pell-mell and restore the 
line. 

The Fourteenth Indiana in this action lost 13 men killed and 
33 wounded. Lieutenant H. J. Caldwell, of Company I was mor- 
tally wounded here. 

In his report of this particular part of the battle, Major Gen- 
eral Hancock, commanding the Second Corps, says : "At 4 p. m. 
I was directed to form my troops for an assault on the enemy's 
line at 4 a. m. on the 12th. The head of the column arrived at 
the Brown House, near which it was proposed to form the troops 
for the attack about midnight, going into position as soon as they 
came up. Gibbon's division was also sent me, so that I had my 
whole available corps for the assault. A heavy fog prevailed, 
and I waited until 4:35 a. m. before giving the order to advance. 
The column moved at quick time for several hundred yards, 
marching over the enemy's pickets without firing a shot. It con- 
tinued up the slope about half way to the enemy's line, when the 




COLONEL JOHN COONS, Fourteenth Indiana Volunteers 
Killed at "Bloody Angle", Spottsylvania Court House, Va., May 12, 1864 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 105 

men broke into a tremendous cheer, and, spontaneously taking 
the double-quick, they rolled like an irresistible wave into the 
enemy's works, tearing away what abatis there was in front of 
the entrenchments with their hands, and carrying the line at all 
points in a few moments, although it was desperately defended. 
A fierce and bloody fight ensued in the works, with bayonets and 
clubbed muskets. 

"It was short, however, and resulted in the capture of nearly 
4,000 prisoners of Johnson's Division of Ewell's Corps ; 20 pieces 
of artillery, with horses, caissons and material complete ; several 
thousand stands of arms, and upwards of 30 colors. Among 
the prisoners was Major General Edward Johnson and Brigadier 
General George H. Stewart. The enemy fled in great confusion 
and disorder. The interior presented a terrible and ghastly spec- 
tacle of dead, most of whom were killed by our men with bayo- 
nets, when they penetrated the works. So thickly lay the dead at 
this point that at many places the bodies were touching and piled 
upon each other." 

In this charge Colonel John Coons, commanding the Four- 
teenth Indiana, and among the bravest of the brave, fell while 
crossing the enemy's works, and Captain John S. Simons, of 
Company D, of the same regiment, was mortally wounded. Cap- 
tain Nathan Willard, of Company E, who assumed command of 
the regiment after the death of Colonel Coons, was wounded 
seriously; and then the command of the regiment devolved upon 
Captain W. H. Patterson, of Company G. 

Lieutenant Horace Bradford, of Company E, and Lieutenant 
William D. F. Sandon, of Company G, were also wounded in this 
action. The scene of this terrible charge was what is known in 
history as "the bloody angle" at Spottsylvania Court House. 

Besides its colonel and Captain Simons killed, the Fourteenth 
Indiana lost 5 men killed, and 6 officers and 70 men wounded ; in 
all 83 men. 

The Second Army Corps moved from here to Cold Harbor 
on the 1st of June, 1864; and on this march, and during its re- 



106 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

maining service, the Fourteenth Indiana was commanded by Cap- 
tain William Donaldson, Captain Patterson having been wounded 
after he assumed command of the regiment. 

The term of service of the regiment expired while it was in 
line of battle at Cold Harbor ; but before it was relieved from duty 
there on the 6th of June, 1864, it lost 5 men killed and mortally 
wounded, and 11 men wounded. George Mull, of Company H, 
Fourteenth Indiana, who had never missed a fight in all of his 
three-years' term of service, was killed in action, on the last day 
of his term of service. 

On the 6th of June, 1864, 125 men of the Fourteenth Indiana, 
while in line of battle at Cold Harbor, were discharged by rea- 
son of expiration of their terms of service, and 58 veterans and 
recruits, under Sergeant William Cole, were consolidated with 
the Twentieth Indiana Volunteers. 

The total enrollment of the regiment from first to last, includ- 
ing recruits, was 1,134 officers and men. Of this number 150 
were killed in action, or died of wounds received in action, and 
442 were wounded, making the total of killed and wounded in the 
regiment 502 men. 

Taken as a body, officers and men, Indiana certainly sent to 
the field no more splendid regiment in all the Civil War than the 
Fourteenth Regiment. 

The record shows that the officers were always on the firing 
line; and the men in the ranks who had distinguished themselves 
for gallantry were promoted, took their places among the officers ; 
and because so bravely led, this regiment was always found where 
the work was most desperate. 




COLONEL SAMUEL 
Killed i 



J. WILLIAMS, Nineteenth Indiana Volunteers 
1 Battle of Wilderness May 6, 1864 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 107 



CHAPTER VIII. 



Nineteenth Indiana Volunteer Infantry. 

The Nineteenth Regiment Indiana Volunteer Infantry was 
organized and recruited as follows : Companies A, E and K in 
Delaware County ; Company B in Wayne County ; Company C in 
Randolph County ; Companies D and F in Marion County ; Com- 
pany H in Johnson County; Company I in Owen County, and 
Company G in Elkhart County. 

The regiment was recruited on the first call for three years' 
volunteers and when there were thousands of young men anxious 
to enter the service who had been disappointed in not being per- 
mitted to enter the service on the first call for seventy-five thou- 
sand men. 

When the second call came, the regiment was virtually already 
recruited and all that was required was for the ten companies 
comprising the regiment to be called together at Indianapolis for 
muster into the United States service. The companies were made 
up of the choice of the young men of the splendid counties of the 
State from whence they came, and no regiment went out from the 
State with a finer body of men than did the Nineteenth Indiana 
Volunteers. If there was such a thing, it might have been called 
a "pet" regiment of Governor Morton, a large part of it coming 
from the portion of the State where he had had his home and 
practiced law, and it was but natural that he should give the com- 
mand of the regiment to his old neighbor and friend, Solomon 
Meredith of the Governor's native county of Wayne. Colonel 
Meredith was without military training, but he was an enthusi- 
astic friend of the Governor, and threw his whole soul into the 
work of equipping the young men of Indiana for service in the 
field. Colonel Meredith was active, vigilant and brave, and as his 



108 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

military history shows, as long as he was able, never quailed in the 
hour of danger. He was one of the men who did much to make 
Oliver P. Morton known in all the world as the great War Gov- 
ernor of Indiana. 

The regiment was mustered into the service of the United 
States at Camp Morton on the 29th day of July, 1861, with Sol- 
omon Meredith as Colonel ; R. A. Cameron as Lieutenant Colonel ; 
Alois O. Bachman as Major; J. P. Wood as Adjutant; Lewis 
Dale as Chaplain; Calvin J. Wood as Surgeon, and William H. 
Kendrick as Assistant Surgeon. Surgeon Kendrick and Assis- 
tant Surgeon Green both resigned early in the service, and Abra- 
ham B. Haines became Assistant Surgeon on the 26th day of July, 
1862, and continued with the regiment in that capacity during its 
entire service, and followed the remnant of the regiment that 
finally consolidated with the Twentieth Indiana Volunteers. 

It left Indianapolis August 5th and joined the Army of the 
Potomac at Washington, D. C, on the 9th of that month and went 
into camp at Kalorama Heights, in the northwestern part of the 
city near where the beautiful equestrian statue of General Mc- 
Clellan stands. 

Toward the latter part of the month it left camp and crossed 
the Potomac river at Chain Bridge into Virginia, and camped on 
the heights back of that river at a point where Fort Ethan Allen 
was immediately marked out by the engineers, and the regiment 
assisted in its construction. 

On the 11th of September it became engaged in an affair at 
Lewinsville, Va., losing three killed and wounded and 3 missing. 
On the 28th of September the regiment participated in the ad- 
vance upon, and the occupation of Falls Church, Va. Soon after 
this occurrence it moved to Arlington Heights, across the Potomac 
river from the city of Washington, D. C. Here the regiment went 
into quarters and with the Second, Sixth and Seventh Wisconsin 
Regiments of Infantry, and Battery B, Fourth United States Ar- 
tillery, was organized into a brigade under the command of Gen- 
eral Rufus King. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 109 

While at this camp the regiments of this brigade constructed 
Fort Craig, one of the line of forts extending from above Chain 
Bridge to Alexandria, and below, along the west side of the river, 
for the defenses of Washington. 

On the 16th of January, 1862, Lieutenant Colonel R. A. Cam- 
eron bade adieu to the regiment and left for Indiana to take com- 
mand of the Thirty-fourth Indiana (Morton Rifles), having been 
made Colonel and assigned to the command of that regiment. 
Major Bachman then became Lieutenant Colonel, and Captain 
May of Company A became Major of the regiment. 

The regiment, with its brigade, remained at Fort Craig until 
March 10th, 1862, when it moved in "the grand advance," under 
General McDowell, and assisted in capturing the "Quaker Guns" 
at Manassas, on its march through the mud and high waters, to- 
ward Fredricksburg, Va., where it arrived about the 23d of April, 
at a point near Falmouth, Va. On the 10th of May, Captain John 
Gibbon of Battery B, Fourth United States Artillery, took com- 
mand of the brigade, having been made Brigadier General of Vol- 
unters, which caused a little disappointment among some of the 
colonels of the regiments composing the brigade, who had hoped 
to be made brigade commander. General King became Division 
Commander. 

Toward the latter part of May the regiment, with its command, 
marched in the direction of the Shenandoah Valley, but soon re- 
turned, stopping near Warrenton, Va. It remained there until 
August 5th, when it again moved to Fredricksburg, and from 
there, on a reconnaisance in the direction of Spottsylvania Court 
House. 

It reached Cedar Mountain on August 10, in which vicinity 
it remained until the army under Pope fell back before the ad- 
vancing Confederate forces. While on this retreat, late in the 
afternoon of the 28th, the brigade had a very severe engagement 
with the "Stonewall" (Jackson's) Division of Confederate troops 
near Gainesville, Va. In this engagement the Nineteenth lost 187 
killed and wounded and 33 missing. Among the killed was the 



110 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

gallant Major May. Captain W. W. Dudley of Company B then 
became acting Major. 

This Gainesville affair was the "initial" battle of the Second 
Bull Run. Late in the afternoon of this day an enemy was sus- 
pected to be near the point where this encounter took place, and 
the brigade was sent in to feel his strength and position. "We 
went, we saw, and they conquered ! And but for the darkness, 
which, very fortunately for our small, unsupported force, which 
had thus been sent in, had fallen soon after the engagement had 
commenced our entire force would probably have been destroyed 
or captured. Very soon after the commencement of this action, 
General Gibbon observed a Confederate battery in the act of 
taking a position on the left of our line where it could enfilade our 
small force at short range. He directed Major Dudley to take 
two companies of the Nineteenth and silence that battery, which 
he succeeded, promptly and gallantly, in doing. This achievement 
of Major Dudley, together with the darkness which was then fall- 
ing, undoubtedly prevented the destruction or capture of our little 
force that night." For some unaccountable reason very meager 
reports of this encounter were made by the Generals in command, 
notwithstanding its seriousness and importance. 

General Rufus R. Dawes, formerly of the Sixth Wisconsin, in 
his book, "History of the Sixth Wisconsin," says that "on this 
occasion our little force, less in numbers than one brigade, en- 
countered the entire 'Stonewall' Division of Confederates, con- 
sisting of thirty regiments of infantry and two batteries of artil- 
lery." 

The Nineteenth was again engaged on the 30th of August, at 
Manassas Junction, with a loss of 28 killed and wounded and 11 
missing, after which it marched with the army to Washington, 
and thence to Frederick City, Md. 

On the 14th of September, the regiment participated in the 
battle of South Mountain, Md., and was now in the First Army 
Corps, commanded by General Joseph Hooker. In this action it 
lost 40 killed and wounded and 7 missing. In this battle, and for 




MAJOR ISAAC MAY, Nineteenth Indiana Volunteers 
Killed in Action at Gainsville, Ya., August 28, 1862 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 111 

the work which it had accomplished here, this brigade, of which 
the Nineteenth was a part, was given, by General McClellan, the 
name of "Iron Brigade," and was always thereafter so designated. 

Soon after the commencement of the battle, Generals Mc- 
Clellan and Hooker were reconnoitering the rebel lines, when 
General McClellan remarked: "General Hooker, If I had an Iron 
Brigade I could pierce the enemy's center by taking the gorge on 
the pike." General Hooker replied : "General McClellan, I have 
that brigade in my command !" Whereupon, this brigade was 
detached from Hatch's Division and assigned to the duty of taking 
the gorge, thereby piercing the enemy's center. 

The late General John B. Callis, formerly of the Seventh Wis- 
consin, in a letter related a conversation he had had with General 
McClellan concerning the Iron Brigade, as follows : "General 
McClellan said : 'It was during the battle of South Mountain, my 
headquarters were where I could see every move of the troops on 
the pike with my glass. I saw the men fighting against great odds. 
When General Hooker came in great haste for orders, I asked 
him what men those were fighting on the pike. He replied : 'Gen- 
eral Gibbon's Brigade of Western men.' I said : 'They must be 
made of iron.' Hooker replied : 'By the Eternal, they are iron ! 
If you had seen them at Bull Run as I did, you would know them 
to be iron.' Then I said to him: 'Why, General Hooker, they 
fight equal to the best troops in the world.' After the battle I saw 
General Hooker at the Mountain House, near where the brigade 
fought, and he sang out : 'General McClellan, what do you think 
now of my Iron Brigade?' " 

Those who participated in that battle know how gallantly the 
Pass was won, after a sanguinary struggle lasting until 9 o'clock 
at night, during which time the brigade suffered a loss of 309 
men, out of about 1200 who went into the action. 

On the 17th of September, three days after South Mountain, 
the Nineteenth was conspicuously engaged at Antietam, losing 
79 men killed and wounded, and 18 missing, out of 210 officers 
and men, who went into the battle. Among the killed was Lieu- 



112 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

tenant Colonel Alois O. Bachman, while in command of the regi- 
ment, and leading it in a charge on one of the enemy's batteries. 
After the fall of Lieutenant Colonel Bachman, Captain Wil- 
liam W. Dudley, of Company B, and later in the war brevet Brig- 
adier General Dudley, as senior officer of the regiment, took com- 
mand and led his men during the remainder of the engagement. 
His report of the battle, preserved in the official records, is as fol- 
lows: 

Camp, Gibbon Brigade, 
September 21, 1862. 
Sir: 

I have the honor to submit the following report of the part 
taken by the Nineteenth Indiana Volunteers in the battle of the 
17th instant: Owing to the fall which Colonel Meredith received 
in the battle of the 28th of August, and the subsequent fatigue 
and exposure of the marches up to the 16th instant, he was un- 
able to take command of our movements across the Antietam 
Creek. The command now fell upon Lieutenant Colonel Bach- 
man. Immediately on crossing the creek we were advanced in the 
line of battle up the hill in a plowed field, which covered the brow 
of the hill. Lieutenant Colonel Bachman immediately deployed 
Company A, Sergeant Eager, forward as skirmishers through the 
corn field, in order to protect our front and the crossing of our 
division, which being accomplished, we were ordered to join the 
brigade and move further up to the right. We stopped for the 
night, having closed column by division on first division, right in 
front. 

Early on the morning of the 17th instant we were called up 
and prepared to go into action. We moved directly to the front, 
in column by division. Our first casualty occurred in a peach or- 
chard near the destined battlefield. 

We now moved to the edge of a corn field, near a stone house, 
which was immediately used as a hospital. Here we lay down 
while our skirmishers were scouring the corn field in front. We 
were soon ordered to the right to a piece of woods which skirted 




LIEUTENANT COLONEL ALOIS (). BACH.MAN, Nineteenth Indiana Volunteers 
Killed in Action September 17, 1862 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 113 

the battlefield on the right. Here we deployed column and formed 
our line of battle on the right of the Seventh Wisconsin Volun- 
teers, and Lieutenant Colonel Bachman ordered Company B, then 
my command, to deploy forward as skirmishers. This being done, 
the regiment moved slowly forward until the right was through 
the woods, when we halted. It was at this time that the attempt 
was made to take Battery B, Fourth Artillery, which was sta- 
tioned at the straw stacks near the stone house hospital. Upon 
seeing the advance of the enemy, Lieutenant Colonel Bachman at 
once called in the skirmishers and changed front forward on the 
tenth company so as to front the left flank of the enemy. 

As soon as it was practicable we opened fire on them, and we 
have every reason to believe that our fire was very effective in re- 
pulsing their attack on the battery. Soon we saw the enemy fall- 
ing back in great disorder, and it was at this juncture that the 
gallant Lieutenant Colonel Bachman, yielding to the urgent ap- 
peals of the men, gave the order to charge, and hat in hand and 
sword drawn, he gave the order "double quick" and bravely led 
on, the men following, cheering as they advanced. We charged 
across the pike and followed the retreating rebels to the brow of 
the hill, over which they had a strong reserve of infantry and 
three pieces of artillery, which pieces seemed to have been aban- 
doned by horses and men. It was at this point that brave Lieu- 
tenant Colonel Bachman fell mortally wounded, and I took com- 
mand immediately. As soon as we could carry his body to the 
rear, we fell back to the pike and rallied. 

Here we received an enfilading fire, the enemy having suc- 
ceeded in approaching within 100 yards of our right, under cover 
of the woods. We again fell back to our old position and re- 
mained there until relieved by one of General Patrick's regiments. 
We then fell back in good order slowly about 30 rods into the open 
field. 

In making the charge and retiring our colors fell three times, 
the bearers severely wounded. When they fell the last time, they 
were picked up and carried off the field by Lieutenant D. S. Hoi- 



114 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

loway of Company D. One of our men captured a rebel flag and 
took it to the rear. In this charge Lieutenant William Orr of 
Company K was severely wounded. At this time, about 2 o'clock 
p. m., we retired from the field in good order and formed in a strip 
of woods to the rear of the battlefield, with the other three regi- 
ments of our brigade for the purpose of stopping stragglers. 

Our loss in killed was Lieutenant Colonel A. O. Bachman and 
7 men; wounded Lieutenant William Orr, Company K, and 70 
men ; missing 26 men. 

The officers all vied with each other in the performance of 
their duty and too much praise can not be awarded the non-com- 
missioned officers for their gallant conduct; and the men of this 

regiment are all brave men, if we except the few who found their 
way to the rear when danger approached. 

I am respectfully your obedient servant, 

William W. Dudley, Captain Company B. 
Commanding the Nineteenth Indiana Volunteers. 

Lieutenant Frank A. Haskell. 

Acting Assistant Adjutant General, Gibbon Brigade. 

On the day following the battle of Antietam, Captain Dudley 
was promoted to the rank of Major of his regiment, and on the 
8th of October, 1862, he was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant 
Colonel of the same. 

After the battle of Antietam, the regiment remained in camp 
in the vicinity of Sharpsburg, where on the 6th of October, 1862, 
the brigade to which it belonged was joined by the Twenty-fourth 
Michigan Infantry. From that time on the famous Iron Brigade 
was composed of the Second, Sixth and Seventh Wisconsin In- 
fantry, the Nineteenth Indiana Infantry, the Twenty-fourth Mich- 
igan Infantry and Battery B, Fourth United States Artillery. The 
latter was commanded by Captain John Gibbon, who was subse- 
quently made Brigadier General, and assigned to the command of 
the brigade which was designated as the First Brigade, First Di- 
vision, First Army Corps, and was the extreme right of the Army 
of the Potomac. 




LIEUTENANT COLONEL W. W. DUDLEY 

Nineteenth Indiana Volunteers, who as Captain Company B, Commanded Regiment after 

the fall of Lieutenant Colonel A. O. Baehman at Antietam 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 115 

On the 14th of October, the brigade marched from its camp in 
the vicinity of Sharpsburg, to Bakersville, Md., and remained 
there until the 25th, when it resumed its march, passing through 
Keedysville and Crampton's Gap. The brigade recrossed the Po- 
tomac on a pontoon bridge near Berlin, on the 30th of October, 
1862, and from this point moved to Warrenton, Va., and from 
there by easy marches to the Rappahannock River, opposite Fred- 
ricksburg. 

It remained in camp here until the battle of Fredricksburg, on 
the 11th 12th, 13th and 14th of December, 1862, and when the 
Army of the Potomac, under Major General Burnsides, after a 
bloody contest of four days, was compelled to fall back north of 
the Rappahannock, the Nineteenth Indiana covered the rear, and 
was the last regiment to recross the river. 

In this engagement it was commanded by Lieutenant Colonel 
Samuel J. Williams, and its loss was 3 men wounded and 4 men 
missing. 

It then marched to the Bells Plain landing on the Potomac, and 
went into camp, remaining there until the 28th of April, 1863, 
(with the exception of the three days in January, spent in a futile 
attempt on the part of General Burnsides in trying to move an 
army through the mud of Virginia in the winter time.) 

On the 28th of April, 1863, the Nineteenth marched to Fitz- 
hugh's crossing, below Fredricksburg, and the next morning 
crossed the Rappahannock, when it immediately engaged the ene- 
my, losing 4 killed and wounded. The movement at this point was 
a feint, to enable the main army to cross the river above. The 
Nineteenth, on May 2d, with the command to which it was at- 
tached, recrossed the Rappahannock and marched up the river to 
the United States Ford, and, crossing there, before daylight on the 
morning of the 3d, took a position in the line of battle near Chan- 
cellorsville, but did not become engaged at that time. The regi- 
ment remained there until the morning of the 6th, when the Union 
army was withdrawn to the north side of the river, and the Nine- 
teenth again went into camp near Fitzhugh's crossing. 



116 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

On the 21st of May it marched with the brigade to assist the 
return of a cavalry force which had been sent down the peninsula 
between the Rappahannock and Potomac rivers, and had been cut 
off by the burning of a bridge across the Mattox creek by the 
rebels. The bridge was rebuilt, the cavalry crossed and all re- 
turned to their old camp on the 27th, where they remained until 
June 12th, when the march toward the north, on the Gettys- 
burg campaign was commenced. 

The movement from this point, Fitzhugh's crossing, was al- 
most a continuous march during the remainder of the month, from 
the 12th to the 30th of June, via Bealton, Manassas, Herndon Sta- 
tion, and crossing the Potomac river at Edwards' Ferry ; thence 
across Maryland through Frederick City and on to Emmitsburg, 
Pa., and arriving at Marsh Run, four miles from Gettysburg, on 
the evening of June 30th. On the early morning of July 1st the 
regiment, with its command, moved toward Gettysburg, reaching 
the battlefield just as the engagement was opening. 

The division to which the Iron Brigade was attached was the 
first infantry force to engage the enemy. And the brigade in a 
charge made soon after the commencement of the battle on this, 
the first day, captured the entire "Archer's" Confederate Brigade 
of about 1,500 men, consisting of the Thirteenth Alabama, Fifth 
Alabama, Battalion First Tennessee, Seventh Tennessee and Four- 
teenth Tennessee Regiments. On the afternoon of the same day 
the Nineteenth was engaged in helping to resist the desperate 
charge made by the Confederate army upon the First and Eleventh 
Corps, but was forced to fall back to Seminary Hill. 

During this day's battle the Nineteenth fought as though the 
existence of the entire army depended upon each man's exertions. 
And it met with the unprecedented loss of 210 killed and 
wounded out of 288 that went into the battle. The desperate and 
heroic bravery of the officers and men of each regiment of the 
Iron Brigade was in all alike conspicuous with proportionate 
losses in this day's struggle. 

We find no report of any officer in command of the regiment 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 117 

in this bloody battle, but General Doubleday, commanding the 
First Division of the First Army Corps, in a very full report (Vol. 
27, Part 1, Records of the Union and Confederate Armies) of the 
work of his division, tells of the deeds and work of the Nineteenth 
Indiana. He says : "In the Nineteenth Indiana, Private James 
Stickley of Company C, deserves special mention for refusing to 
leave the field when badly wounded. He was killed later in the 
action. Lieutenant Jones (Richard) of Company B, and Lieu- 
tenant East (Crockett T.) of Company C, fell while cheering their 
men on. Sergeant Ferguson (James) and Beshears (Andrew) of 
Company H, Winset (Thomas) and Daugherty (Thomas J.) of 
Company K, Michener (Thomas K) of Company E, Ogborn (Al- 
len W.) of Company B, were among the killed, who are worthy of 
special mention. The active and fearless Lieutenant Colonel Dud- 
ley, lost a leg; Major Lindley, always cool and courageous, was 
wounded in the hand; Captains Holloway (David P.) Company 
D, Ives (Joseph T.) Company C, Shafer (John W.) Company 
G, and Lieutenants Wilson (William B.) Company H, Schlagel 
(Samuel B.) Company B, Campbell (William M.) Company C, 
Wittemeyer (Isaac W.) Company E, Macy (William W.) Com- 
pany C, Branson (Isaac) Company E, Patrick (Chauncy B.) 
Company I, Gisse (Adam) Company A, Nash (James R.) Com- 
pany F, were also wounded while doing all that men could do 
to insure success." 

The two last mentioned officers refused to leave the field. 
Captains Hart (Patrick H.) Company H, Makepeace (Alonzo 
J.) Company A, Greene (George W.) Company E, and Lieu- 
tenant Richardson (Harland) Company F, fell into the hands 
of the enemy. This regiment was commanded by Colonel Samuel 
J. Williams, and to his promptness and courage and skill, it is in 
a great measure indebted for increasing the high reputation it 
already enjoyed. 

When we look over that awful list of killed, wounded and cap- 
tured officers of the regiment on the first day of the battle of Get- 
tysburg, it is not a matter of wonder that the official report of 



118 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

what the regiment did there had to come from some other source 
than officers of the regiment. 

The regiment was so nearly wiped out of existence that the 
survivors seem to have felt that it was mere mockery for them to 
tell how it was done. 

Company B came out of the battle with a sergeant and four 
men, and in all the regiment but 78 men and Assistant Surgeon 
Abraham B. Haines survived, who were fit for duty. 

On the 2d and 3d days of July the regiment occupied a posi- 
tion on Seminary Hill, but was not actively engaged. During 
these two days its loss was two wounded, one mortally. 

The "Old Iron Brigade," being among the first on the field, it 
had to meet the first shock of a desperate attack of a far superior 
force. And nobly, right nobly did it do its whole duty, and surely 
is entitled to a full measure of the honors it justly earned, and 
won, in that great struggle. 

A special correspondent of a New York paper, writing of the 
Iron Brigade at Gettysburg, said : "Reynolds has ridden into the 
angle of the woods, a bow-shot from the Seminary, and he cheers 
the Iron Brigade of Meredith as they wheel on the flank of the 
oak trees for a charge. Like a great flail of steel they swing into 
the shadows (of the trees) with the huzza that is as terrible as a 
volley. Low crouching — dismounted — at his horse's head — the 
General peeps into the depths of the grove. Crash ! From the 
oak recesses, rang a hailstorm of lead, and Reynolds, with the 
word of command upon his tongue, falls forward bodily. The 
light of pride in his eye grows dull as blindness ! The bronze flush 
on his face is veined with blue ! Two men bear away a dripping 
stretcher to the edge of the town, and the Architect of the battle 
has fallen dead across its portal. Grief — terror — have here no 
space to live in. Across the brook and up the ridge, with a yell 
that is shot through and through with their own volleys, two 
jagged arcs of gray leap into sight, wheeling, the one for the 
woods, the other, pushing through the gorge of the old railway. 
Huzza ! Huzza ! From the skirts of the 'oaks' the great double- 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 119 

doors of the Iron Brigade shut together as with a slam of collid- 
ing mountains, folding between them fifteen hundred rebel pris- 
oners of war. Patrick Maloney, a brawney Irishman in blue, 
siezes General Archer by the throat. 'Roight about face, Gineral, 
March !' Ere you can think, the disarmed column is over Sem- 
inary Ridge, and the grinning 'Celt' has said to General Wads- 
worth, looking on from the Seminary shadows : 'Gineral Wads- 
worth, I make you acquainted with Gineral Archer.' " 

On the 6th of July the regiment moved from Gettysburg to 
Emmitsville, with its command. On the following day it com- 
menced its toilsome return southward, arriving at Rohrersburg, 
near Berlin, Md., on the 16th. On the 18th it crossed the Potomac 
at Berlin, and marched to Rappahannock Station, Va.. where it 
arrived about August 1st. It then moved to Culpepper and re- 
mained in that vicinity until the latter part of November, when 
the Mine Run campaign commenced. The regiment participated 
in the battle of Mine Run on the 30th of November, after which 
it again went into camp near Culpepper. 

On the 1st of January, 1864, a portion of the regiment re- 
enlisted as Veterans, and returned to Indiana on veteran fur- 
lough. They returned to their old camp near Culpepper, March 
4th. 

On the 4th of May, 1864, the Nineteenth Indiana, as part of 
the First Brigade, General Lysander Cutler, Fourth Division, 
General Wadsworth's Fifth Army Corps, General Warren, moved 
from its winter quarters near Culpepper, crossed the Rapidan and 
bivouacked for the night near Wilderness Tavern. In addition 
to its old associates, the Second, Sixth and Seventh Wisconsin, 
and the Twenty-fourth Michigan, it was now associated with and 
as a part of the same brigade, the gallant Seventh Indiana. 

On the morning of the 5th of May the brigade moved forward, 
found the enemy, attacked him, and in a desperate encounter, the 
Nineteenth lost 7 men killed, 75 wounded and 15 captured. 

Among the killed was the Colonel of the regiment, Samuel J. 
Williams, who fell gallantly leading his regiment. 



120 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

Upon the fall of Colonel Williams, Lieutenant Colonel John 
M. Lindley assumed command of the regiment and continued in 
command through the months of May, June, July and August, 
and until after the command had reached Petersburg. 

On the 18th of August Captain William Orr of Company K 
was mustered as Major of the regiment and assumed command 
on the 31st of August, according to the roster of the army of that 
date. 

The Nineteenth Indiana, with its brigade, was again engaged 
with the enemy on the 8th of May at Laurel Hill, and from that 
date, until the 12th was constantly on the skirmish line and during 
this period lost 6 men killed and 1 1 wounded. 

From the 12th, upon which date the brigade was desperately 
engaged, to the 20th, it was constantly on the skirmish line, but 
both sides fought behind breastworks. The loss of the Nineteenth 
during this period was 6 men killed and 2 officers and 31 men 
wounded. 

On the 20th of May General Lee fell back towards Hanover 
Junction, and the Army of the Potomac pressed forward in pur- 
suit. On the morning of the 23d General Lee turned upon his 
pursuer and a desperate battle ensued on the North Anna river, 
near Jerico Mills. In this action the Nineteenth Indiana lost 2 
men killed and 10 wounded. 

On the 27th of May the Army of the Potomac fell back across 
the North Anna, moved rapidly to the left, crossed the Pamunky 
river and occupied a position in the vicinity of Cold Harbor. 

Here was fought one of the bloodiest battles of the war on the 
3d of June. The position of the Nineteenth in this engagement 
was at Bethseda church, nine miles from Richmond. The Nine- 
teenth Indiana was on the skirmish line and its loss was 3 killed 
and 12 wounded. It continued in line until the 6th of June, when 
it moved to the rear with its corps, and for the first time in a 
month, was out of range of the enemy's fire. 

On the night of June 12th the corps moved to the left, crossed 
the Chickahominy river and on the morning of the 15th reached 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 121 

the James river which it crossed on the 16th and marched rapidly 
in the direction of Petersburg, south of Richmond, where a great 
battle was in progress. 

On the morning of the 17th the Nineteenth, with its brigade, 
took its place in the line of battle and was ordered to advance, 
which it did, driving the enemy some distance before it, and halt- 
ing, threw up breastworks. 

During the night the enemy fell back and on the 18th an as- 
sault upon his works was ordered and the order was obeyed, but 
with terrible results, as the enemy fired from behind his field 
works and the Union troops fought in the open. But the advance 
was maintained and before nightfall the advanced line was secure- 
ly entrenched within 300 yards of the enemy's line. 

The Nineteenth Indiana occupied its part of this line until the 
1st of August, and the corps was relieved and began the move- 
ment which finally proved successful, to cut the Weldon railroad, 
south of Petersburg. 

On the 18th of August, 1864, the Nineteenth Indiana, with its 
brigade, commanded by Brigadier General E. S. Bragg, was en- 
gaged at Yellow Tavern, on the Weldon railroad, but it sustained 
little loss, and that was the last engagement of the brigade in 
which the Nineteenth Indiana participated, as the term of ser- 
vice of that gallant regiment expired on the 7th of September, 
and the men entitled to muster out of the service were sent 
home for discharge, and 107 men, whose term of service had 
not expired, were temporarily assigned to the Seventh Indiana. 

On the 18th of October the men of the Nineteenth Indiana not 
entitled to discharge were consolidated with the Twentieth Indi- 
ana Volunteers and Major William Orr, of the Nineteenth be- 
came Colonel of the Twentieth Indiana, as now constituted, 
Colonel John M. Ljndley having been mustered out of service on 
this last consolidation. Assistant Surgeon Abraham B. Hains. of 
the Nineteenth Indiana, was continued as Assistant Surgeon of 



122 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

the reorganized Twentieth Indiana until the 8th of March, 1865, 
when he was promoted to Surgeon of the One Hundred Forty- 
sixth Indiana. Captain John W. Shafer, Lieutenants William W. 
Macy, William B. Wilson and Jesse N. Potts were continued as 
officers of the reorganized Twentieth. The men of this last reor- 
ganization, formerly connected with the Nineteenth Indiana, were 
finally mustered out of the service at Louisville, Ky., on the 12th 
of July, 1865. 

Aside from the report of Captain W. W. Dudley, who com- 
manded the Nineteenth Indiana at the battle of Antietam, and led 
the regiment off the field after the fall of Lieutenant Colonel 
Bachman, and simple reports of casualties as they occurred, we 
find no reports in the official records preserved by the government, 
by the officers who at different times commanded this splendid 
regiment. 

It fought bravely wherever engaged and was an especially 
heavy loser of men at Gainesville, South Mountain, Antietam, 
Fredricksburg, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, The Wilderness, Cold 
Harbor, Petersburg and Yellow Tavern, but the searcher for its 
record is invariably compelled to look for its achievements to the 
reports of brigade and division commanders, to learn what the 
Nineteenth Indiana did. While the regiment was almost wiped 
out of existence and lost 210 men out of 288 engaged at Gettys- 
burg, we only learn of the particulars of this awful sacrifice from 
the report of its division commander, General Doubleday. The 
officers of the regiment seem to have been satisfied to do the work 
and leave someone else to tell the story. 

When the Nineteenth Indiana went into the field it numbered 
1,048 men, field, staff, line and enlisted men, and the recruits re- 
ceived while in the field raised the number of men connected with 
the regiment to 1,246 men. 

On the 20th of July, 1864, 102 men were mustered out, whose 
term of service had expired and had not re-enlisted. 

When consolidated with the Twentieth Indiana, the regiment 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 123 

numbered 303 men and officers, which number included 107 men 
received from the Seventh Indiana. 

Three field officers of the regiment were killed in action, name- 
ly, a Colonel, a Lieutenant Colonel and a Major. The percentage 
of loss of the regiment exceeds that of any other regiment going 
into the Civil War from Indiana, and its name will live in history 
while the story of that war survives. 



124 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 



CHAPTER IX. 



The Twenty-Seventh Indiana Volunteers. 

The Twenty-seventh Indiana Volunteers was recruited in the 
months of July and August, 1861, Company A being recruited at 
Greencastle, Company B at Ruglesville, Company C at Edinburg, 
Company D at Bedford, Company E at Washington, Company F 
at Bloomington, Company G at Morgantown, Company H at 
Paris Crossing, Company I at Putnamville, and Company K at 
Jasper. 

The companies assembled at Indianapolis and were there 
mustered into the service of the United States, for three years, 
on the 12th day of September, 1861. 

The officers of the new regiment were: Colonel, Silas Col- 
grove; Lieutenant Colonel, Archibald I. Harrison; Major, John 
Mehringer; Adjutant, Robert B. Gilmore; Quartermaster, James 
M. Jamison; Chaplain, Thomas A. Whitted; Surgeon, Jarvis J. 
Johnson ; Assistant Surgeon, Green V. Woollen. 

On the 15th of September, 1861, the regiment left Indianapolis 
and went to Washington by rail. 

Arriving at Washington the regiment went into camp at Kalo- 
rama Heights, and after remaining there about two weeks, was 
assigned to General Banks' Army of the Shenandoah. 

On the 29th of September the regiment marched to Darnes- 
town, Maryland; and when the disaster occurred to our troops 
at Balls Bluffs, on the Potomac, two weeks later, the regiment 
made a hasty march to that point. From Balls Bluffs the regi- 
ment returned to Darnestown and remained there until Decem- 
ber, when it moved camp to near Fredrick, Maryland. 

The last of February, 1862, the regiment crossed the Potomac 
at Harper's Ferry and two weeks later reached Winchester. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 125 

The regiment was now a part of the Third Brigade, composed 
of the Eighty-third New York Volunteers, the Twenty-ninth 
Pennsylvania Volunteers, the Twenty-seventh Indiana Volun- 
teers and the Third Wisconsin Volunteers, the brigade being 
commanded by General Charles S. Hamilton. The brigade was 
part of the First Division commanded by Brigadier General 
Alpheus S. Williams and the Fifth Army Corps. 

On Saturday, the 22d of March, 1862, the division of General 
Williams took up its line of march to Manassas by way of Berry- 
ville and Snickers Ferry, and thus had no part in the first battle 
of Winchester on the 23d of March, but upon Stonewall Jackson's 
second invasion of the Shenandoah Valley the regiment with its 
brigade marched to Strasburg, and there the regiment felt the 
first impact of Jackson's return to the Valley at Bucktown on the 
23d of March, where Company B of the Twenty-seventh and a 
company of the Third Wisconsin were guarding a bridge. In a 
spirited engagement lasting most of the afternoon nine men of 
Company B, Twenty-seventh, were wounded. 

On the 24th Banks' army fell back from Strasburg to Win- 
chester. On this retreat Jackson's forces coming in on a side road 
stopped Banks' column and he was about to lose his wagon train. 
The Twenty-seventh hastened back and in the midst of much ex- 
citement among the teamsters held its position against the enemy 
until every movable wagon was safe. 

On the morning of the 25th the regiment was occupying a po- 
sition on the extreme left of its brigade, the left of the regiment 
resting on the turnpike. It was held in reserve until the enemy 
began a flank movement of the brigade when it wheeled into line 
of battle and from that time on was in the fiercest part of the en- 
gagement, until the entire brigade, with the army, was compelled 
to fall back. 

The loss of the Twenty-seventh Indiana in this engagement 
was 3 men killed, 3 officers and 14 men wounded and 3 officers 
and 101 men captured or missing. 

From Winchester Banks' army fell back to Williamsport, a 



126 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

distance of thirty-five miles, followed by the enemy. As General 
Banks says in his report, "The pursuit of the enemy was prompt 
and vigorous, but our movements rapid and without loss." Ac- 
cording to the General's report thirty-five miles of his march from 
Winchester to the Potomac was made in one day, and the retreat 
did not end until his army was on the north side of the Potomac. 

After three weeks at Williamsport, the Twenty-seventh moved 
southward early in July with its brigade going towards Culpepper 
by way of Chester Gap. 

At Culpepper, the Twenty-seventh Indiana became a part of 
Pope's Army of Virginia, its brigade still commanded by Briga- 
dier General Gordon and still designated as the Third Brigade, 
First Division, Second Army Corps. The regiments of the bri- 
gade were now the Third Wisconsin, Colonel Ruger, Second 
Massachusetts, Colonel Andrews, and Twenty-seventh Indiana, 
Colonel Colgrove. The Twenty-ninth Pennsylvania, nominally 
attached to this brigade, was and for months had been on detached 
duty. 

The brigade reached Culpepper on the night of August 8th, 
and the next morning Banks' Corps moved southward in the di- 
rection of Cedar Mountain, a distance of eight miles, and arrived 
on the battlefield late in the afternoon, but in time to share ac- 
tively in this most bloody conflict. The Twenty-seventh Indiana 
fought here under the eye of its brigade commander until our 
troops were withdrawn from the field and suffered quite seriously. 

In this action the Twenty-seventh Indiana lost 1 officer. Lieu- 
tenant George W. Reed, Company I, and 14 men killed, 1 officer 
and 28 men wounded and 1 officer and 5 men missing or captured. 
Later Lieutenant Thomas J. Box, Company D, was wounded 
and captured. 

Of the men reported wounded it is said five were mortally 
wounded. Banks' Corps, which had done the principal fighting 
at Cedar Mountain, fell back with all the army, before the ad- 
vancing Confederates, and while his troops in the disastrous Sec- 
ond Bull Run campaign were always within call of where they 




BREVET BRIGADIER-GENERAL and COLONEL SILAS COLGROVE 
Twenty Seventh Indiana Volunteers 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 127 

were needed, but the call never seemed to come at the opportune 
time, and thus the remaining days of August passed, for the regi- 
ments connected with Banks' command, in marching and counter- 
marching in hot suns, rain, dust and mud, witnessing the expiring 
throes of the short lived Army of Virginia, but not called on or 
permitted to do anything to prolong its existence. 

Pursuing this kind of uncertain military existence, the Twen- 
ty-seventh Indiana found itself, at the end of Pope's bloody fiasco, 
in Washington with all the disorganized mass of troops that had 
congregated there by the vicissitudes of war, out of which a new 
army was soon to be organized on a definite plan with a definite 
work before it. 

In the early days of September, 1862, by direction of the Pres- 
ident, Major General George B. McClellan took up the work 
of reorganizing the Army of the Potomac. 

The Twenty-seventh Indiana still remained a part of the Third 
Brigade, First Division, the brigade and division commanders re- 
maining the same as they had been, but they were now a part of 
the Twelfth Army Corps, commanded by Major General Joseph 
K. F. Mansfield. 

The Third Brigade, as now constituted, was made up of the 
Twenty-seventh Indiana, Second Massachusetts, Thirteenth New 
Jersey, One Hundred Seventh New York and a detachment of 
the Zouaves d'Afrique, Pennsylvania, without officers, attached 
to the Second Massachusetts. 

Having crossed the Potomac on the 4th of September, the regi- 
ment, with its brigade and division, moved to near Tennallytown 
and camped. On the 5th it moved to Rockville, on the 10th to Da- 
mascus, on the 12th of Ijamsville, on the 13th to near Fredrick, 
on the 14th to South Mountain and bivouacked, on the 15th 
moved to Keedysville and bivouacked, and lay in line of battle 
all day of the 16th, and on the 17th the division and brigade took 
an active part in the battle of Antietam, under General Mansfield, 
on the right. 

The part taken in the great and bloody battle of Antietam on 



128 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

the 17th of September, 1862, by the Twenty-seventh Indiana is 
so well told in the report of the Colonel who commanded the regi- 
ment on that memorable day that we give the report entire, and as 
written five days after the battle. 

Headquarters Twenty-seventh Regiment Indiana Volunteers. 

September 22, 1862. 
Sir: 

I beg leave to submit the following report of the part taken by 
my regiment (Twenty-seventh Indiana Volunteers) in the action 
of the 17th instant, near Sharpsburg, Md. : 

About sunrise in the morning I received orders to get my regi- 
ment under arms. I immediately formed my regiment in column 
by battalion, close in mass, right in front. The brigade was 
promptly moved to the front, the Second Massachusetts occupy- 
ing the right, the Third Wisconsin second, my regiment third, the 
One Hundred Seventh New York fourth, and the Thirteenth New 
Jersey the left or rear. In this position the brigade was moved 
forward, I should judge a distance of two thirds of a mile. 

At this point, as by this time the action had become general 
and severe on our left, under your direction, the brigade was im- 
mediately moved to the left. The Second Massachusetts, Third 
Wisconsin and Twenty-seventh Indiana Regiments moved to a 
point designated by you, and formed their line of battle on a swell 
of ground immediately in front of a corn-field, in which the battle 
had been raging for some time. Our troops in the corn-field, a 
part of General Hooker's division, had been badly cut up, and 
were slowly retreating. When we first gained our position, the 
corn-field, or nearly all of it, was occupied by the enemy. This 
field was on a low piece of ground, the corn very heavy, and serv- 
ing, to some extent, to screen the enemy from view, yet the colors 
and battle flags of several regiments appearing above the corn 
clearly indicate the advance of the enemy in force. Immediately 
in front, or beyond the corn-field, upon open ground, at a distance 
of about 400 yards, were three regiments in line of battle, and 
farther to the right, on a high ridge of ground, was still another 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 129 

regiment in line diagonally to our line. When we first took our 
position it was impossible to immediately open fire upon the enemy 
without firing into our own troops, who were retreating out of the 
corn-field. As soon as these troops had filed past my left. I im- 
mediately ordered my regiment to fire, which was done in good 
order. The firing was very heavy on both sides, and must have 
continued for more than two hours, without any change of posi- 
tion on either side. It was very evident from the firing that the 
enemy was greatly superior in numbers at this point. The only 
force during this time at this place engaged was the three old 
regiments of your brigade. At one time during this part of the 
engagement the fire of the enemy was so terribly destructive it 
seemed our little force would be entirely annihilated. 

After the fight had raged for about two hours, without any 
perceptible advantage to either side, some of our forces (I have 
never learned whose) came up on our left in a piece of woods on 
the left of the corn-field, and opened an enfilading fire upon the 
enemy. This fire and ours in their front soon proved too hard for 
them. They broke and fled, in utter confusion, into a piece of 
woods on the right. We were then ordered to fix bayonets and 
advance, which was promptly done. Advancing through the corn- 
field, we changed front to the right by throwing our left forward. 
We had advanced over the larger portion of the ground when we 
were ordered to halt. I soon discovered that General Sumner's 
corps had arrived and were fresh, not yet having been in the ac- 
tion, and the work of dislodging the enemy from the woods, de- 
signed for your shattered brigade, had been assigned to them. 

At a later hour in the day my regiment and the Third Wiscon- 
sin were ordered to advance nearly over the same ground to the 
support of the Second Massachusetts, Thirteenth New Jersey and 
One-hundred-and-seventh New York, who had been posted in or 
near the woods held by the rebels, to the rear of the corn-field. 
We promptly advanced nearly to the woods, but before we could 
get there our forces had been cut up and fallen back. The two 
regiments held their position until the enemy had been driven back 



130 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

by a well-directed shower of grape and canister from one of our 
batteries, after which we took up a position in rear, and in support 
of the batteries. The Twenty-seventh Regiment, as well as the 
balance of your brigade, was under fire from before sunrise until 
after dark, and although the main part of the fighting they were 
engaged in, occurred in the fore part of the day, yet during the 
whole day they were frequently exposed to heavy fire from the 
enemy's artillery. At night I was temporarily, by you, placed in 
command of the brigade, and the whole brigade marched to the 
front and nearest the enemy, in support of our batteries in front. 
Although our men had gone into the fight without breakfast and 
had fought all day, they performed this arduous duty without 
grumbling, but with cheerfulness. 

Subsequent events of the day have disclosed to us that the 
troops your brigade so bravely fought and conquered at Antietam 
were the same troops you fought at Winchester on the 25th of 
May last — Ewell's old division, eight regiments — Louisiana, Geor- 
gia and South Carolina regiments. I am proud to be able to report 
to you that I believe every officer and man of my regiment who 
went into the fight with me did his whole duty. I saw no man or 
officer who took a backward step during the whole day, unless 
ordered to do so. 

I went into the fight with 443 men, rank and file. My loss in 
action was: killed, 17; wounded, 192. Most of the wounds are 
slight ; many, however, severe and mortal. Quite a number of am- 
putations have been necessary. Twelve deaths among the wound- 
ed have been reported to me. A list of the killed and wounded is 
herewith submitted. 

Your obedient servant, 

S. Colgrove, 
Colonel Twenty-seventh Regiment, Indiana Volunteers. 

Brig. Gen. George H. Gordon, 

Commanding Third Brigade. First Division, Banks' Corps, 
Army of the Potomac. 




LIEUTENANT COLONEL ABISHA L. MORRISON 
Twenty-Seventh Indiana Volunteers 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 131 

Among the killed of the Twenty-seventh Indiana in the battle 
of Antietam were Lieutenants Robert B. Gilmore and William 
Vanorsdall, of Company A; Lieutenant Jacob A. Lee, of Com- 
pany C, and Captain Peter Kop, of Company F. Among the 
wounded were Captain John W. Wilcoxen, of Company A ; Cap- 
tain Josiah C. Williams, of Company C ; Lieutenant Joseph Bals- 
ley, of Company D ; Captain James Stephens, of Company E. and 
Captain John W. McKahin, of Company H. 

Early in the day, and before the disposition of the troops of 
the Twelfth Corps had been fully made, Major General Mansfield, 
commanding the corps, fell mortally wounded, and the command 
of the corps fell to Brigadier General Williams, who had com- 
manded the First Division of the corps. Brigadier General Gor- 
don took command of General Williams' division, and Colonel 
Thomas H. Ruger, of the Third Wisconsin, took command of the 
brigade to which the Twenty-seventh Indiana was attached. 

From Colonel Colgrove's report it will be observed that the loss 
of the Twenty-seventh Indiana was over 47 per cent, of the men 
with which it went into action, certainly a record that entitles the 
regiment to be commemorated by a monument on this bloody field. 

After the battle of Antietam the regiment, with its division, 
moved to Brownsburg, by way of Sharpsburg, on the 19th ; to 
near Sandy Hook, over Maryland Hights, on the 20th ; upon 
Maryland Hights the 22d, where it remained until the 28th, and 
then moved down to Sandy Hook, where it remained until the 1st 
of October. The Third Brigade remained on Maryland Heights 
until the 29th of October, when it was ordered to the position held 
by General F. J. Porter, near Sharpsburg. 

Upon the advance of the Army of the Potomac into Virginia, 
after the battle of Antietam, Major General H. W. Slocum as- 
sumed command of the Twelfth Corps. The main body of the 
Twenty-seventh Indiana was camped at Dam No. 4, on the Poto- 
mac, guarding the river at that point, and when comfortably quar- 
tered for the winter, orders came to move, and in the early part 
of December the division moved to Fairfax Station. Here again 



132 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

the troops housed themselves for the winter, and late in January 
orders came again to march to Stafford's Court House. 

The Twenty-seventh remained here in camp until the 27th of 
April, when it moved, with its brigade and division, to Kelley's 
Ford, on the Rappahannock river, by way of Hartwood church, 
encamping at the latter place the first night, and a mile and a half 
from Kelley's Ford on the second night. On the morning of the 
29th of April the division crossed the Rappahannock at Kelley's 
Ford and took the road to Germania Ford, on the Rapidan. Two 
and a half miles out from Kelley's Ford the division encountered 
the enemy's cavalry, with which the cavalry in advance of Wil- 
liams' division skirmished until within three miles of Germania 
Ford. Brigadier General Ruger now commanded the Third Bri- 
gade, to which the Twenty-seventh Indiana was attached, and 
that brigade led the advance in this movement, and the Twenty- 
seventh led the advance of its brigade, followed by a section of 
artillery, and was the first to reach the ford, capturing a force of 
the enemy there, numbering about one hundred, engaged in erect- 
ing a bridge. The Twenty-seventh led the advance in fording the 
Rapidan at this point, and the water was so deep that it was neces- 
sary to remove cartridge boxes. On the 30th the division moved 
to Chancellorsville, and on arriving there Ruger's brigade was 
posted on the left of the plank road west from Chancellorsville 
and in the center of the division, and an abatis was at once con- 
structed in front of the line occupied by the brigade. 

On May 1, the Third Brigade, to which the Twenty-seventh 
was attached, moved out on the plank road east of Chancellors- 
ville, on the left of the First Brigade, and the division moved 
toward the enemy in the direction of Fredricksburg. This move- 
ment was for the purpose of making a reconnaissance of the en- 
emy's position, and after some skirmishing with the enemy, the 
division returned to its former position and constructed sub- 
stantial breastworks, behind the abatis it had erected, when the 
division first took position. From this position the Twenty-sev- 
enth Indiana and Third Wisconsin moved forward under orders 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 133 

and constructed breastworks in the edge of a woods, and diagonal 
to the line of the brigade breastworks, so as to enfilade, by their 
fire, any approach of the enemy to the brigade breastworks. The 
Twenty-seventh Indiana occupied the left of the brigade. 

Colonel Colgrove, commanding the Twenty-seventh, so well 
describes the work his regiment performed in this situation, that 
only his language should be employed in its narration: "Being 
the left of the brigade, I drew my regiment up in line, at, or nearly 
at, right angles with our breastworks, or the original line, the eight 
right companies resting inside the breastworks, the two left com- 
panies outside and on a line with the other eight companies. At 
this time, immediately in rear of my left, was a perfect jam of 
artillery and caissons, many of which had been abandoned ; some 
of them had been left standing, horses and all ; in some instances 
the limbers had been dropped and in others the teams had been cut 
loose, leaving everything. As near as I could learn, but few offi- 
cers remained with them. I finally succeeded in finding a Lieuten- 
ant Lewis, of what battery I did not learn. I requested him to 
put two pieces on my left, on a high point of ground commanding 
the ravine in front of the breastworks. He could only find five or 
six of his men, and I made a detail from my regiment to assist 
him. We finally succeeded in getting the two pieces in position. 
About this time a line officer of the One-hundred-and-tenth Penn- 
sylvania Regiment came up with about two hundred men, and re- 
ported that he had no field officers with him, and requested me to 
take charge of them. I put them in position in rear of the artil- 
lery, with orders to support it, which they did with alacrity and 
bravery. I wish to remark here that these men stayed with me 
during the night and through the right next day, and behaved most 
gallantly. 

"About the time I succeeded in getting the two pieces of artil- 
lery in position, a portion of the One-hundred-and-seventh New 
York Regiment reported to me without a field officer. I put them 
in position on my left. These arrangements were scarcely com- 
pleted before the rebels made a charge upon our breastworks with 



134 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

terrific yells. I immediately caused both pieces of artillery to 
open fire, first with shell and afterwards with grape and canister. 
I am very confident that the fire from these two pieces of artillery, 
enfilading the whole length of the ravine and abatis in front of 
the breastworks, did much to check the rebel advance. 

"Shortly after sunrise on Sunday morning, the 3d, the enemy 
having obtained possession of our breastworks on the right, ad- 
vanced on our line and opened fire. In a very short time the 
whole line became engaged. The enemy advanced steadily, de- 
livering their fire with telling effect. The whole line stood firm. 
No part of the line yielded an inch or wavered. The enemy 
poured in regiment after regiment of fresh troops, determined to 
break the line ; but whenever and wherever they made their ap- 
pearance, they found our fire so deadly that they were forced to 
halt and seek shelter behind the timber and rises in the ground. 
After the battle had progressed an hour or more, my officers noti- 
fied me that the ammunition was running out. I immediately 
ordered the whole line to fix bayonets and charge, which was done 
in gallant style. The rebels fled before us like sheep, and took 
refuge behind the breastworks and reopened fire upon us. After 
delivering a few rounds, I ordered a second charge. Our men 
charged the breastworks on the extreme left of our line. In some 
instances a regular hand-to-hand fight took place. The enemy 
soon gave way, and being in our abatis, they were soon thrown 
into the utmost confusion. While endeavoring to retreat through 
the brush and tree tops, they became mixed up in a perfect jam, 
our men all the time pouring in the most deadly fire. I can safely 
say that I have never witnessed, on any occasion, so perfect a 
slaughter." 

The loss of the Twenty-seventh Indiana at Chancellorsville 
was 32 killed and mortally wounded and 118 wounded. 

The officers killed, or who died of mortal wounds, were Lieu- 
tenant Simpson Hamrick, of Company A ; Captain John A. Cas- 
sady, of Company D ; Lieutenant Isaac Van Buskirk, of Company 
F, and Lieutenant Julian F. Hoffer, of Company K. 




MAJOR JOHN MEHRIGER 
Twenty Seventh Indiana Volunteers 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 135 

The official list of casualties gives 3 officers and 17 men killed, 
and 9 officers and 117 men wounded, but the mortally wounded 
made the list of killed 32. Captain Stephen Jerger, of Company 
K, lost a leg, and was honorably discharged on account of it Au- 
gust 9, 1863. 

Colonel Colgrove, who commanded the regiment, was one of 
the wounded officers, but he remained with his regiment, led it off 
the field, and did not mention the fact that he had been wounded 
in his report of the battle written a few days later. 

And thus it was that this splendid regiment, which had fought 
so bravely to make Chancellorsville a victory, and which we must 
believe would have been a victory had all the regiments there 
fought like it did, fell back to its old camp across the Rappahan- 
nock, where it remained until the sunny days of early June, pon- 
dering its awful loss, and again took up the line of march with 
its brigade, division and corps, for the field of Gettysburg, where 
it was again to receive a new baptism of blood. 

After a weary march out of Virginia, across the neck of Mary- 
land, with its old brigade, division and corps, the Twenty-seventh 
Indiana arrived on the battlefield of Gettysburg on the morning 
of July 1, and ready for the old game of war it had played so well 
at Winchester, Cedar Mountain, Antietam and Chancellorsville. 
and on the 2d, 3d and 4th of July went in with its old ardor and 
maintained the record it had already so nobly won. 

In the great battle, General Slocum, commanding the Twelfth 
Corps, was placed in command of the right wing of the army ; 
General Williams took command of the corps, General Ruger of 
the division, and Colonel Colgrove commanded the Third Brigade, 
and Lieutenant Colonel John R. Fessler commanded the Twenty- 
seventh Indiana. 

On the 2d the brigade skirmished with the enemy, in its front, 
and in which there was, for it, no very serious fighting, but on 
the morning of the 3d, the Second Massachusetts and Twenty- 
seventh Indiana, under orders, charged the enemy's works in their 



136 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

front, which became so much of a slaughter that these two gallant 
regiments had to be recalled after suffering frightful loss. 

In this charge the Second Massachusetts lost 130 men killed 
and wounded, and the Twenty-seventh Indiana 112 men, out of 
339 men, rank and file, which it took into action. 

Lieutenant Colonel Fessler's report shows 15 men killed and 
83 wounded, including 7 commissioned officers, in the charge, and 
18 men killed and 93 wounded in the entire engagement. 

Among the wounded officers were Lieutenants Thomas J. Box 
and Joseph Balsley, of Company D ; Lieutenant George L. Fesler, 
of Company G, and Lieutenant Thomas Nugent, of Company H, 
who lost a leg. 

After the corps, to which the Twenty-seventh Indiana be- 
longed, had marched back into Virginia, from Gettysburg, the 
regiment, with its brigade, was sent to New York City, on a two 
weeks' trip, to aid in quelling the draft riot which was threatened 
there, and shortly after its return to Virginia the Eleventh and 
Twelfth Corps were transferred to the Army of the Cumberland, 
in Tennessee, going there by rail by the most expeditious route. 

There the brigade and division passed the winter, at Tulla- 
homa, Tennessee, and about the last of April, 1864, moved to the 
front, the Twelfth Corps being merged into the Twentieth Corps, 
under command of Major General Hooker. 

The first fighting of the Twenty-seventh Indiana in the west 
was at Resaca, on the 15th of May. The regiment fought here 
with its old-time gallantry, and, as usual, suffered severely, but 
it had some compensation there in an exploit that has become 
historic. As the regiment stood in line of battle, concealed by a 
pawpaw thicket, a rebel regiment was seen approaching it in line 
of battle. Colonel Colgrove ordered his men not to fire a shot 
until he gave the word, and when the rebel regiment, which proved 
to be the Thirty-eighth Alabama, had approached to within thirty 
yards, the order was given, and the Twenty-seventh poured a 
murderous fire into its enemy, and followed this up by a rushing 
charge, capturing the Thirty-eighth Alabama entire, including the 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 137 

colonel of the regiment, who carried its colors. These were 
snatched from his hand by Private Elijah White, of Company D, 
who handed them to the captain of his company. 

In the battle of Resaca the Twenty-seventh Indiana lost 11 
killed and mortally wounded and 48 wounded. 

Among the killed at Resaca was Lieutenant George Chapin, of 
Company I. and among the wounded was Lieutenant George Ste- 
phenson, of Company D, who lost an arm. 

Ten days later, on the 25th of May, the Twenty-seventh partic- 
ipated in the battle of New Hope Church, where its killed and 
mortally wounded numbered 7, and its wounded were 31, and 
one captured. 

The Twenty-seventh next participated in the battle of Peach 
Tree Creek, on the 20th of July, where its loss was 7 killed and 
mortally wounded and 21 wounded. Among the wounded was 
Colonel Colgrove, of the regiment, who was so seriously injured 
as to disable him for further service. 

The next work of the regiment was to participate, as an inde- 
pendent organization, in the siege of Atlanta, and on the 1st of 
September, 1864, the regiment was marched back to the Chatta- 
hoochee River, where the men who had served three years, and 
were entitled to discharge, were mustered out of service. 

On the 4th of November, 1864, the remnant of the regiment, 
including veterans and recruits, numbering 240 men, were con- 
solidated with the Seventieth Indiana Volunteers, and supernu- 
merary officers were mustered out of the service. 

Those men of the regiment consolidated with the Seventieth 
served on the campaigns through Georgia and the Carolinas, and 
on the muster out of the Seventieth, the remnant of the Twenty- 
seventh were consolidated with the Thirty-third Indiana Volun- 
teers, and finally mustered out of service on the 21st day of July, 
1865, at Louisville, Kentucky. 

The total number of men connected with the Twenty-seventh 
Indiana was 1,322, and number of men accounted for was 1,270. 
The number of non-commissioned officers and men that died in 



138 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

the service was 263, and the number of commissioned officers 
who died was 12. The number who re-enlisted as veterans was 
154 and the number of recruits was 75. The original number of 
enlisted men was 982. 

The number of men killed and mortally wounded in action 
during the entire term of service of the regiment was 169. The 
number of men wounded in action was 527. 




LIEUTENANT COLONEL JACOB S. BUCHANAN 
Third Indiana Cavalry 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 139 



CHAPTER X. 



Third Indiana Cavalry. 

The companies of the Third Indiana Cavalry (A, B, C, D, E 
and F), that were connected with the Army of the Potomac, in 
the Maryland campaign of 1862 and participated in the battle of 
Antietam, on the 17th of September, 1862, as part of the Second 
Brigade, of the Cavalry Division, under General Alfred Pleas- 
anton, were all recruited in counties bordering on the Ohio River, 
with the exception of Company F. 

In the early months of the Civil War the authorities at Wash- 
ington gave little encouragement to the recruiting of cavalry or- 
ganizations in Indiana, and when the above companies were re- 
cruited, and their services tendered to the Governor of Indiana, 
that official could only procure their acceptance by the government 
on condition that the men entering such organizations furnish 
their own horses. But the desire of the young men offering them- 
selves for the cavalry arm of the service was such that they com- 
plied with the government's conditions, and each man furnished 
himself with a good Indiana horse. 

Companies A and C were recruited in Switzerland county, 
Company B in Harrison county, Company D in Dearborn county, 
Company E in Jefferson county, and Company F in Fayette, Rush, 
Marion and Shelby counties. These companies were originally 
recruited for the First Indiana Cavalry (Twenty-eighth Volun- 
teers), for which camps of rendezvous were established at Ev- 
ansville and Madison. 

Conrad Baker was commissioned Colonel of the First Indiana 
Cavalry, and, with eight companies that had assembled at Evans- 
ville, was mustered into the United States service on the 20th 



140 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

of August, 1861, and, under orders, he proceeded to St. Louis 
and became a part of General Fremont's command. 

The six companies that had rendezvoused at Madison, to be- 
come a part of the First Indiana Cavalry, instead of following 
the first eight companies into the Western field, were, with Lieu- 
tenant Colonel Scott Carter, who had been left in charge of them, 
sent east to the Army of the Potomac, and on the 21st of October, 
1861, by an order of the Adjutant General of the State of Indiana, 
they were designated the Third Indiana Cavalry (Forty-fifth 
Regiment), and Lieutenant Colonel Scott Carter was commis- 
sioned Colonel of the new regiment. Four other companies, G, H, 
I and K, not quite ready for the field when the six companies went 
east, were also made a part of this new regiment, but when 
mustered into the service, instead of being forwarded to the regi- 
ment to which they belonged, were sent to Kentucky, and distrib- 
uted at the headquarters of different division commanders, com- 
manding our forces around Louisville. And in 1862, when two 
other companies, L and M, were recruited for the Third Indiana 
Cavalry, after being held in the State for service under the pro- 
vost marshal for more than a year, they were also forwarded 
south instead of east, and in February, 1864, after long separation, 
these six companies in the west finally got together at Marysville, 
Tennessee, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Robert 
Klein, who had originally gone to the field as captain of Com- 
pany K. 

It is thus seen that the two halves of the Third Indiana Cav- 
alry were widely separated during the entire war, and never op- 
erated together, although in the assignment of officers the regi- 
ment was treated as acting as a whole by the Governor of Indiana. 
The eastern battalion retained the position of Colonel, while the 
western battalion was commanded by a Lieutenant Colonel, after 
the resignation of Lieutenant Colonel Jacob S. Buchanan, October 
25, 1862. 

Thus it was that while the Third Indiana Cavalry, with the 
Army of the Potomac, was never anything more than a battalion 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 141 

of six companies, yet it was brigaded with regiments of twelve 
companies, and required to perform the duties of a full regiment, 
and whilst these duties were frequently onerous and severe, the 
battalion was ever proud to realize that it met every emergency, 
and made a name for itself that stands out in history, among the 
bright records made by many Indiana regiments in the Civil War, 
and entitles it to be remembered among the noble regiments that 
served their country on the bloody field of Antietam. 

The first assignment of the battalion, after reaching Washing- 
ton, in September, 1861, was with the division of Major General 
Hooker, then lying at Bladensburg, and after remaining there a 
few days, went with that officer and his division to Budd's Ferry, 
on the lower Potomac, and about forty miles below Washington. 
At this point General Hooker's division was confronted by a 
large force of the enemy on the opposite side of the river, and 
the principal pastime of these two hostile forces was shelling each 
other with artillery planted on the opposite bluffs of the Potomac. 
It was seldom any one was hurt by this artillery fire, at such long 
range, but it was always wise to be on the lookout and dodge when 
necessary. 

During about four months of this first winter in the field, while 
General Hooker maintained his headquarters at Budd's Ferry, 
the headquarters of the battalion were also maintained there, but 
four of the companies, A, B, E and F, were employed in scouting 
and picketing, for many miles along the lower Potomac and 
through the adjacent territory. Lower Maryland, in those days, 
was a seething hotbed of secession, and a Union man was a curi- 
osity, and so uncomfortable was it for young men of that type in 
this section of the State that several of them actually enlisted in 
one of the companies of the Third Indiana Cavalry as a measure 
of safety. Mail between Baltimore and Richmond passed about 
as regularly through lower Maryland as it ever had, only it was 
not carried by United States officials. Emissaries of the Confed- 
erate Government at Richmond were not only employed in carry- 
ing the mail, but contraband travel through the country and across 



142 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

the Potomac River was so thoroughly protected by the people of 
the section that it became a difficult task to break it up. Rich- 
mond, by way of Baltimore, was about as well informed of what 
was going on in Washington as were the people of Washington 
themselves. 

By numerous lines of travel, parties from the North and from 
the South were constantly passing through this section of Mary- 
land, being ferried over the Potomac in various kinds of small 
river craft, impossible of detection or capture by the government 
flotilla stationed in those waters. It was because of the failure of 
our gunboats to seriously interfere with this sort of thing, and 
thus enable the government at Richmond to be kept fully advised 
of every movement of the government at Washington, that the 
Third Indiana Cavalry was assigned to this duty. And the only 
assistance the battalion had from any portion of the population 
of this exceedingly disloyal section of the country was from the 
slaves, who were still held in bondage, and in whose ownership 
the government still protected their masters. While Maryland 
sent a number of splendid regiments to the field in behalf of the 
Union, it is not recorded in history that more than a corporal's 
guard of Union soldiers were ever recruited from the southern 
portion of the State of Maryland. 

In no way can the force of this statement be better impressed 
than to call attention to the historical fact that when John Wilkes 
Booth, the assassin, had committed his bloody deed, he hastened 
into this portion of Maryland, over the route he had already 
chosen, as the safest way to escape his pursuers, and where for 
days he was concealed by leading citizens, before he attempted 
to cross the Potomac into Virginia. With the whole country 
aroused, and the government sleuths on his trail, he found security 
in the portion of lower Maryland where the Third Indiana Cav- 
alry was assigned to duty during the first winter of the war. The 
hostility to the Union there never died out, and it was a very fa- 
miliar fact to the assassin of our martyred President. 

It was part of the work of the battalion to picket the Maryland 




BREVET MAJOR GENERAL and COLONEL CEO. H. CHAPMAN 
Third Indiana Cavalry 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 143 

shore of the Potomac at night, and be on the lookout for the small 
craft that plied those waters, carrying mail and passengers from 
one shore to the other. 

These small craft would shoot out of the mouth of some creek 
after nightfall, going south and coming north, and there was many 
an exciting race, on water as well as by land, by the men of the 
battalion, in pursuit of these blockade runners. The men of the 
battalion became so expert in handling small river craft that Gen- 
eral Hooker called them his "horse marines." 

When Hooker's division went to the peninsula with McClellan, 
in April, 1862, the battalion of the Third Indiana Cavalry was 
sent to Washington, and from there, after a few days, was sent 
to Thoroughfare Gap, Virginia, where it joined General Geary's 
brigade. Later it joined General Shields' division at Luray, and 
covered his retreat to Front Royal, after his defeat at Fort Re- 
public. 

From there it followed in General Shields' wake to Catletts 
Station, and then on to Falmouth, Virginia, where it became a 
part of General Rufus King's division. 

The battalion remained at Falmouth and Fredricksburg until 
the evacuation of the latter city, the last of August. 

During the time it was connected with General King's division 
the battalion was engaged in scouting the country south of Fred- 
ricksburg, in the direction of Richmond, and had frequent skir- 
mishes with the enemy's cavalry, scouting in the direction of our 
lines. 

In one of these excursions it went as far as Anderson's Turn- 
out, twenty miles from Richmond, on the Virginia Central Rail- 
road, where it destroyed a considerable amount of rebel stores, 
and, after dispersing a squadron of rebel cavalry, captured a num- 
ber of prisoners. 

After the evacuation of Fredricksburg, the battalion was or- 
dered to Washington, where, in the reorganization of the Army 
of the Potomac, it was assigned to the Second Brigade, of the 
Cavalry Division, under General Alfred Pleasanton. 



144 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

The brigade comprised the battalion of the Third Indiana, the 
Eighth Illinois Cavalry, the Eighth Pennsylvania Cavalry, and a 
part of the First Massachusetts Cavalry, and the brigade was com- 
manded by Colonel John F. Farnesworth, of the Eighth Illinois, 
and the battalion by Lieutenant Colonel Jacob S. Buchanan. 

In the movement northward through Maryland, in the cam- 
paign of 1862, the battalion was with the extreme advance cav- 
alry of the Army of the Potomac, and in a number of brisk skir- 
mishes encountered the enemy's cavalry hovering on the flanks 
and rear of Lee's army, as he moved northward through Mary- 
land. 

After General Lee crossed the Potomac and invaded Mary- 
land, his cavalry came down almost to the northern defenses of 
Washington, and the Federal cavalry had hardly begun its ad- 
vance northward as the vanguard of the new Army of the Poto- 
mac until it encountered the cavalry of the enemy. In all of 
these cavalry skirmishes the battalion of the Third Indiana was 
active. 

On the 7th of September a squadron of the battalion, with a 
squadron of the Eighth Illinois, dashed into Poolesville and cap- 
tured the rebel pickets posted in the town, and on the next clay, 
when the entire brigade moved to the village, the enemy's cavalry 
was there in force, with the result of a brisk cavalry and artillery 
engagement, in which the Third Indiana lost one man killed and 
eleven wounded. The battalion was under command of Lieuten- 
ant Colonel Buchanan, but Major Chapman, with two squadrons 
of the same, charged and followed the retreating rebel cavalry to 
Barnesville and Sugar Loaf Mountain, where a stand was made 
and the fight renewed, lasting into the night. From there the 
enemy fell back to Fredrick the next day, the 9th, and on the 
evening of the 12th Farnesworth's brigade entered and took pos- 
session of the city, after a brisk skirmish in the streets, and 
camped there for the night. 

On the morning of the 13th Farnesworth's brigade moved 
out west over the National road, and when three miles out were 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 145 

fired into by rebel artillery posted in the road ahead of it on the 
crest of Catoctin Mountain, and here the Third Cavalry was dis- 
mounted and moved up the mountain through the thickets lining 
the road on either side, and by noon made it so warm for the 
rebel artillery that, with its supporting cavalry, it fled precipi- 
tately down the western slope of the mountain, through Middle- 
town and on to Turner's and Crampton's Passes. In this skir- 
mish the Third Cavalry lost one man killed and several wounded. 
At Middletown Companies E and F, of the Third Indiana, and a 
squadron of the Eighth Illinois, under Major Medill, of the lat- 
ter regiment, were sent south towards Crampton's Pass, in pur- 
suit of a rebel wagon train, and at Quebeck Schoolhouse, two 
miles south of Middletown, when in a narrow defile, were charged 
by the Cobb Legion of Wade Hampton's division, and a hand-to- 
hand encounter took place, in which two men of the Third Indi- 
ana were killed and a number wounded, while the loss of the 
Eighth Illinois was about the same. The rebel cavalry fled after 
making this charge, leaving several of their dead on the field, in- 
cluding Lieutenant Marshall and Sergeant Barksdale, of the Cobb 
Legion. In his report of his operations in the Maryland Cam- 
paign General Pleasanton seems to have forgotten this fight, or 
else never heard of it. 

On the 14th, at the battle of South Mountain, the Third Indi- 
ana was in line with General Hooker's First Corps, and supported 
Battery M, Second United States Artillery, but met with no casu- 
alties. On the 15th, after a cavalry fight at Boonsboro, at 
the western base of South Mountain, the Third Indiana led the 
cavalry advance on the Boonsboro and Sharpsburg pike, to 
the west bank of Antietam Creek, where the entire Army of the 
Potomac halted, and formed for the battle of Antietam, fought 
on the 17th. At noon of the 17th the Third Indiana led the ad- 
vance of the Second Cavalry Brigade across the Middle Bridge, 
over Antietam Creek, and, from that time until nightfall, sup- 
ported Tidhall's and Haines' Batteries, posted on the bluff on the 
right of the pike and just beyond the creek. 



146 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

The battle of Antietam is recorded in history as an infantry 
and artillery battle, but that the cavalry division performed a most 
important part in this great contest, no one familiar with the facts 
will seriously doubt. On the west bank of Antietam Creek, where 
it is crossed by what was and is still known as the Middle Bridge, 
and the uplands for almost a mile back to Sharpsburg, there was 
a distance of nearly two miles, from the left of Richardson's Di- 
vision of Sumner's Corps to the right of Burnside's Ninth Corps, 
that was held by the enemy's skirmishers, and from the hills east 
of Sharpsburg, over the heads of the skirmishers, rebel artillery 
raked this bridge with an enfilading fire. This was the condition 
at that point in the line of battle when, at noon, the Third Indiana 
Cavalry, at the head of its brigade, advanced and crossed the 
bridge under this raking fire, and with the assistance of a portion 
of Syke's regulars, cleared out the rebel skirmishers in that local- 
ity and enabled four batteries of United States Artillery to take 
position on the bluffs north of the Sharpsburg road. From this 
position those batteries did terrible execution in the ranks of the 
enemy's column that was assailing Richardson's Division, and 
they remained there until nightfall by reason of their cavalry sup- 
port, and would never have reached that position or remained 
there but for this support. So confident was General Pleasanton 
of his ability to more than hold his position, that he asked the as- 
sistance of a brigade of Fitz John Porter's Corps to enable him 
to advance his batteries farther on the bluffs nearer Sharpsburg, 
but this assistance was denied him, and he was compelled to con- 
tent himself with what he was able to accomplish in the position 
he had first chosen. The cavalry was withdrawn at nightfall to 
the east side of Antietam Creek, and camped in the woods where 
it had bivouacked for two days before the battle. Here it re- 
mained until early on the morning of the 19th, when it again ad- 
vanced across the Middle Bridge and along the road to and 
through Sharpsburg, as far as the ford of the Potomac at Shep- 
erdstown. Here it encountered the enemy in force on the south 
bank of the river, and after drawing his fire, retired behind the 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 147 

hills out of range. Thus ended the battle of Antietam and the 
invasion of Maryland in 1862. The part the Third Indiana Cav- 
alry had in the battle, and in the Maryland Campaign of 1862, 
was really its baptism in the game of war, and the beginning of 
a splendid career, that only ended at Appomattox in April, 1805. 
The loss of the battalion was 1 officer and 4 men wounded. 

While the army lay on the battlefield of Antietam, in the 
month of October, the battalion accompanied its brigade in three 
different reconnaissances across the river, into Virginia, for the 
purpose of feeling and ascertaining the position of the enemy, and 
on two of these expeditions met the enemy's cavalry at Halltown 
and Martinsburg, and also accompanied the cavalry division in its 
pursuit of Stewart's cavalry, when it crossed the Potomac at Han- 
cock, and raced around the army, by way of Chambersburg, 
which it sacked, and by reason of the fact that men of the bat- 
talion rode the best horses in the army, was the first troop to over- 
take the enemy at the mouth of the Monocacy, and here, after a 
brisk skirmish, recaptured a drove of fat Pennsylvania steers the 
enemy was trying to get into Virginia. Late in October, when 
the army moved south into Virginia, the battalion was in the ad- 
vance with its brigade, and encountered the enemy on the 1st 
of November, at Philamont, on the 2d at Union, on the 3d at Up- 
perville, and on the 4th at Barber's Cross Roads. 

The enemy in all these engagements was the rebel cavalry cov- 
ering the rear of Lee's army, falling back to its position behind 
the Rappahannock at Fredricksburg, and in all of them there was 
brisk fighting. 

The battalion continued with the advance of the army to Fal- 
mouth, and went into camp at Belle Plains. It was in line for 
such duty as it might be called upon to perform at the battle of 
Fredricksburg, but performed no active service there. On the 
9th of April, 1863, it forded the Rappahannock, near the mouth 
of Hazel River, on a reconnaissance, drove the enemy's pickets, 
and later in the day, in a brisk skirmish with the Ninth Virginia 
Cavalry, twenty men of Companies E and F, with their horses, 



148 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

were captured. On the 29th of April the battalion, with its bri- 
gade, was part of Averill's Division of the Cavalry Corps under 
General Stoneman that started on a raid to the rear of Lee's army, 
intending to destroy his communication with his base of supplies. 
The brigade was detached at Raccoon Ford, on the Rapidan, 
and there met a brigade of rebel cavalry under General Fitzhugb 
Lee. Both commands spent the day trying to burn the railroad 
bridge at that point, and each was kept very busy preventing the 
other from accomplishing its purpose. There was lively artillery 
and carbine skirmishing all day, and as a result the bridge was 
left standing, when on the next day, under orders, the brigade 
joined Hooker's army, then engaged at Chancellorsville. It fell 
back with the army, and was not again actively engaged until Lee, 
after his victory at Chancellorsville, again took up his line of 
march northward for the invasion of Maryland and Pennsylvania. 

The cavalry corps was then under the command of General 
Pleasanton, and General Buford was in command of the division 
to which the battalion was attached. Colonel B. F. Davis, of 
the Eighth New York Cavalry, an officer of the regular army 
now commanded the brigade. On the 13th of June the brigade 
crossed the Rappahannock at Beverly Ford, on a reconnaissance 
to ascertain the position and force of the enemy, supposed to be 
heading northward. It acquired the information it was seeking. 
It met a strong force of the enemy which it drove back on a body 
of infantry, and an all-day battle ensued. Colonel Davis, com- 
manding the brigade, was killed in this engagement, besides a 
number of other officers and men, and quite a number wounded. 
The brigade fell back at nightfall with 400 prisoners it had cap- 
tured, many of them of the First North Carolina Cavalry. On 
the 21st of June the battalion, with its brigade, participated in 
a cavalry battle at Upperville, where it met the enemy in close 
quarters, and aided in driving them back with heavy loss. 

On the day following the same commands again clashed at 
Aldie, where there was another severe cavalry fight. 

After the death of Colonel Davis, Colonel Gamble, of the 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 149 

Eighth Illinois Cavalry, succeeded to the command of the brigade 
and continued in command until the following winter. Lieu- 
tenant Colonel Buchanan had resigned and gone home on the 
25th of September, 1862. Colonel Scott Carter, who had not 
been in command of the battalion since the beginning of the 
Maryland campaign, resigned in March, 1863, and George H. 
Chapman, who first came to the battalion as its major, and after 
Lieutenant Colonel Buchanan's resignation, became lieutenant 
colonel, became the colonel of the battalion after Colonel Carter's 
retirement, and was in command at Upperville ; and from that on 
until he assumed command of the brigade to which the battalion 
was attached. 

After the engagement at Aldie the battalion crossed the 
Potomac with its brigade and marched to Gettysburg, entering 
that place on the morning of the 30th of June, 1863, encamping 
a mile out of town on the Chambersburg pike. The next morn- 
ing the enemy advanced in force, and for two hours, until the 
arrival of the First Corps, Buford's Division of Cavalry held the 
enemy in check. 

We make no apology for employing the language of General 
Buford's report of the part taken by the battalion upon this oc- 
casion : 

"The First Brigade maintained this unequal contest until the 
leading division of General Reynold's Corps came up to its as- 
sistance, and then most reluctantly did it give up the front. A 
portion of the Third Indiana found horseholders, borrowed 
muskets and fought with the Wisconsin regiment that came to 
relieve them." Vol. 27, page 926, Part I, Official Records of 
the Union and Confederate Armies. 

Here Major Lemon and seven men of the battalion were 
killed, and a large number wounded, among them Lieutenant 
Martin, commanding Company C. A simple granite shaft marks 
the spot where the battalion acquitted itself nobly on that day. 

When Lee's Army began its retreat from the field of Gettys- 
burg, the battalion moved with the cavalry force in pursuit, en- 



150 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

gaging the enemy at Williamsport, Boonsboro, Beaver Creek, 
Funkstown, Falling Water, Chester Gap, Brandy Station, and 
on the Rappahannock, the last named fight being on the 4th of 
August. 

After this engagement the brigade to which the battalion be- 
longed encamped around Stevensburg, not far from Germania 
Ford on the Rapidan. The rebel cavalry was south of the 
Rapidan, picketing from their side the same fords picketed on 
the north side by the Federal Cavalry. During this time Colonel 
Chapman assumed command of the brigade, and Major McClure 
had charge of the battalion, and four companies of the Twelfth 
Illinois Cavalry heretofore attached to it were detached and 
turned over to the command of Captain Henry L. Reams. On 
the 21st of September, 1863, Buford's Division made a recon- 
naissance across the Rapidan and Robertson's river to Madison 
Court House. There was a hot fight on this expedition near 
Madison Court House, and the Third Indiana was charged by 
the First North Carolina Cavalry ; but a volley from the Third 
changed the charge into a retreat. In this charge one man of 
Company F, of the Third, was killed, and several wounded. The 
enemy left several of their dead on the field ; and the rebel lieu- 
tenant who led the charge was captured at the very muzzles of 
our artillery. 

On the 10th of October General Buford crossed the Rapidan 
at Germania Ford, driving the enemy before him, and moved up 
the south bank of the river to Morton's Ford, to communicate 
with General Newton's First Corps. Here he found that New- 
ton's Corps had fallen back and the enemy entrenched and ready 
for battle. General Buford received orders to fall back; and 
here he also first learned that the enemy was again heading for 
Washington by way of Madison Court House and the right flank 
of our army. Buford's order to advance had been a mistake; but 
it left his cavalry in a "hot box," as his retreat was on a parallel 
with the enemy's advancing column, which was much of the time 
ahead of our advance. It was a running fight until Fairfax Court 




MAJOR CHARLES LEMON. Third Indiana Cavalry 
Killed in Action at Gettysburg, July 1, 1863 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 151 

House was reached. Buford's Division followed in the wake of 
an army train, consisting of 4,000 wagons, and protected it from 
the enemy's pursuing cavalry and light artillery. 

From Fairfax Court House both armies wended their re- 
spective ways to Mine Run by way of their old camps north of 
the Rapidan, lined up for battle, did some skirmishing; and the 
Army of the Potomac retired to the camps again that it had 
twice abandoned, the battalion of the Third Cavalry camping 
near the town of Culpepper. 

On the 27th of February the battalion was selected as a part 
of 4,000 men to go with General Kilpatrick on a raid to Rich- 
mond in the belief that he could capture the city and liberate 
the Union prisoners confined there. In this expedition the bat- 
talion was commanded by Major Patten, and the raid was one 
full of hardships. Major Patten with 500 men, including the 
battalion of the Third Indiana, within one mile of the city of 
Richmond, was ordered to dismount his men and storm the 
enemy's breastworks ; but the order was countermanded by Gen- 
eral Kilpatrick, who discovered its futility. The battalion re- 
turned to its camp near Culpepper on the 15th of March, 1864. 
where it remained until midnight. May 4, 1864, when, as the 
advance of the army, it moved down to Germania Ford, crossed 
the Rapidan, and drove in the pickets of the enemy. Colonel 
Chapman now commanded the brigade to which the battalion be- 
longed, being the Second Brigade of the Third Cavalry Division 
under General James H. Wilson. 

The brigade, with the Third Cavalry in advance, moved up 
the plank road to Wilderness Tavern, then to Parker's Store; 
and on the 5th of May, at Craig's Church met the enemy in a 
severe engagement; and again on the 8th at Spottsylvania Court 
House; and from there started with Sheridan on his raid upon 
Richmond, passing the rear of Lee's Army and cutting his com- 
munication with that city. 

The battalion formed part of the force engaged at Yellow 
Tavern on the 11th of May, and at Meadow Bridge on the 12th. 



152 INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 

The cavalry column moved from in front of Richmond to 
Haxall's Landing on the James, and communicated with General 
Butler's forces in front of Bermuda Hundred. From there the 
battalion crossed the Pamunky river, and rejoined the army near 
Chesterfield on the 25th of May. It participated in the engage- 
ment of Wilson's Division with the enemy's cavalry at Hanover 
Court House on the 30th and 31st of May, 1864; and at Salem 
Church on the 3d of June. 

On the night of Sunday, June 12th, the Army of the Potomac 
left Cold Harbor and began the movement across the Chicka- 
hominy and James rivers. The battalion of the Third Indiana 
Cavalry, as the advance of Wilson's Division, being dismounted, 
forced the passage of the Chickahominy at Long Bridge, driving 
off the enemy's pickets ; and pontoons were speedily placed for 
the passage of the army. 

On June 13th, as a part of Wilson's Division, the battalion 
engaged the enemy at White Oak Swamps and Riddles Shops. 
In the latter part of June the battalion took part in Wilson's raid 
on the South Side and Danville railroad, participating in the cav- 
alry engagements at Nottoway Court House, Roanoke Station 
and Stony Creek. This was the last service of the six companies 
constituting the battalion, as it had served for three years ; and 
the men who had served their time were sent to their homes. 
But 189 veterans and recruits were organized into a "residuary 
battalion," the veterans being designated Company A, reorganized 
under Captain Charles W. Lee, the last captain of the original 
Company A; and the recruits as Company B, reorganized under 
Captain Benjamin Gilbert, who had also been a first lieutenant 
in the original Company A.. 

On the 21st of July, 1864, Colonel George H. Chapman was 
made a brigadier general, and was assigned to the command of 
the Second Brigade, Third Division, under Brigadier General 
James H. Wilson, of the Cavalry of the Middle Division, com- 
manded by Major General P. H. Sheridan in the Shenandoah 
valley. 



INDIANA AT ANTIETAM 153 

Captain Lee was made provost marshal on General Wilson's 
staff; and Captain Gilbert commanded the detachment or residu- 
ary battalion of the Third Indiana Cavalry. 

Under this assignment the battalion served from the 31st of 
August until the 31st of October, 1864, and participated in the 
battle of Cedar Creek on the 10th of October, 1864, where it 
captured two pieces of artillery and four stand of colors. On the 
31st of October, 1864. General George A. Custer was assigned 
to the command of the Third Division, of which General Wilson 
had been relieved ; and Colonel John L. Thompson commanded 
the Second Brigade during the absence of General Chapman, on 
account of wounds received at Cedar Creek. He resumed com- 
mand of his brigade in December; and the residuary battalion of 
the Third Cavalry enrolled under Chapman as brigade, and Cus- 
ter as division commander until the close at Appomattox, and 
wherever Custer and Chapman fought the battalion fought in 
Sheridans' campaign, beginning in February, 1865. It witnessed 
the expiring throes of the great rebellion. From the beginning 
of the Maryland campaign in 1862 until the end in April, 1865, 
and brigaded with other splendid regiments, it was always at the 
front; and the more it accomplished the more it was called upon 
to do. 

The battalion participated in more than seventy cavalry bat- 
tles and skirmishes. The total number of officers and men, in- 
cluding recruits connected with the battalion from beginning to 
the end, was 605. The number of officers and men killed in ac- 
tion or died of wounds received in action was 41. The number 
wounded in action was 232. Taken prisoners or missing, 107. 
Officers discharged on account of disability from disease or 
wounds, 10. Enlisted men discharged on account of disability 
from disease or wounds, 168. Thirteen men of the battalion 
died in southern prisons, and eleven of them at Andersonville. 
Two men of the battalion were lost on the steamer Sultanna in 
the Mississippi river, on their way home after being released 
from prison at Andersonville. 



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